The Faultless Man
by Progenitus
Summary: She called it destiny because it was romantic - and because her life was a melodrama, and Remus was of course the leading man. The problem wasn't so much reaching the Jane Austen ending, however, as staying there. After all, who can really be held up to the title of 'the faultless man', and not disappoint? [RL/OC, a dash of JP/LE and SB/OC]
1. Rustic Chivalry

Disclaimed, including the various plays that will be the title/quotes.

* * *

**Part I: The Romantic Melodrama**

**Chapter 1**

**Rustic Chivalry**

_- he passes the nights singing like a solitary sparrow -_

When asked to describe Arlene, it was without question that everybody who knew her would unanimously choose the word 'unrealistic'.

While it might be considered ill form to give away the heroine's largest character flaw before even the introduction of her hair, it must be said that Arlene Day was not a particularly grounded individual. She would often slip away into her thoughts where reality was less concrete. And as with anybody whose main concern was the comings and goings of those around her, Arlene would think about people as if she was their sole confidante.

_The waiter would be an impoverished art student who paid his tuition by wearing tight jeans; the elevator conductor with the lazy eye was a veteran in the Vietnamese war and lived with the guilt of shooting a dozen men; the grumpy woman behind her in line was frowning at the memory of ruining her last pair of Valentino sandals when shooting pheasants at the hunting range._

Sometimes Arlene's story would be so fabulous that she could no longer distinguish between the imagined and reality, and simply choose to believe the more interesting one. In fact, despite her cynicism, she maintained a firm faith in the dramatics of life.

Presently, however, her mind was fully engaged at trying to convince herself of one thing: that the breakup was good for her, in the grand scheme of things.

Her chauffeur smartly did not try to engage in small talk today, as he drove her home to Sunset Boulevard. It was hard to remain sulky in the grand Californian sun, but the lady was rising up to the challenge admirably.

_Really_, Arlene insisted again, _the best of all possible worlds_—even if it should have been more tragic and beautiful, instead of just plain _ugly_.

Arlene had first approached the soft-spoken Orlando because she thought he had a beautiful name and beautiful calves. He was a self-proclaimed poet, and she had found it endearing to listen to his bad verses about her auburn hair. She had genuinely enjoyed those lazy lunch hours when he would scribble furiously, occasionally looking up to smile at her shyly, and she would draw out the perfect strategic layout for her cheerleading squad. But after cutting his shoulder-length hair and a few weeks of the gym, all the other girls also discovered his calves and flocked to him. Now she couldn't _stand_ how he read his poetry in the school garden at lunchtime, with a dozen flatterers writing their own odes to his poetic genius. It was as if he saw god when he looked into the mirror now.

And she had wanted to build something with the poor artist Orlando. It hadn't mattered that he didn't have an ounce of artistic talent in him—why Arlene felt like she could write better poetry. How hard could it be, really? _Old faces glimmer out of the yellow haze that would dampen steel_—there, she did it. All he did was put colors in front of subjects, with oddly fitted action. Orlando lacked any sort of self-awareness, and that had been charming until that very trait had turned him into an arrogant asshole.

Orlando did not take to the break up very gracefully, nor did his band of girl followers, secretly pleased as they may be. The hoard of them went to the easiest insult, the one that every girl in the neighborhood cringed to hear: _You ugly piece of fat thighs_.

Well, yes, Arlene had to admit, she did not inherit her mother's beauty.

Of course there were many who claimed that she was in fact, the fairest in Beverley Hills, but those were her nurses who dotted on her and the secretaries who fawned over her. They always said that her figure would be strikingly attractive after a few years, when she shed a few stubborn pounds, but she had held the same weight for years now. They also frequently complimented her eyes as being 'green-hazel at its best', although in truth her eyes were a chilly sienna and have never sparkled with the smallest hint of green in her entire life. Their stretching of the truth extended to her innate beauty as well, for they all stood and clapped in tears when she participated in that school play when she was seven. Their words were something along the lines of never seeing such a heartfelt and graceful performance, despite her performance to involve three lines and mostly just dying.

Although to be fair, it wasn't as if anybody could _practice_ dying.

The whole business of _not_ being 'the fairest of them all' never bothered Arlene. She occasionally found herself wishing for her mother's looks, but she never wished for long.

It was so _passé_ to be beautiful, something out of a moralistic Victorian book—all _modern_ heroines were homely. Nowadays it was more about being skinny and pseudo-intellectual. Arlene knew that she did not have beauty, but she had a natural, artful way of being coy, letting her smile trace on the back of people's hearts. That she did inherit from her mother Elayne. Elayne was a second rate actress and songstress, was quite the fetching beauty in her days, as second rate Hollywood girls tended to be—her beauty was the kind that stopped hearts and never lifted them. To her credit, Elayne had the odd situation of being a single mother in Hollywood. The birth father of baby Arlene was probably not much of a looker—what else could have canceled out Elayne's luminosity?

Arlene's father—the one who mattered, who was here, who was home to where she was driving—Augustus Day took a liking to Elayne—that was probably not even her _real_ name. So the only natural course was for Elayne to become involved with the roaring real estate shark. Once Augustus discovered the little baby Arlene, though, whose grubby pink hands always reached to wrap around his own, the hardened property titan began to love the daughter with a purity like never before. He doted on baby Arlene so much, if fact, that when Elayne left—it was uncertain at this point in the story whether she left him, or he left her—Augustus kept Arlene. Caius was born a year after the era of Elayne, and never breached the father-daughter bond that came before him.

All this Arlene knew at the omniscient age of twelve.

Unlike the exaggerated and theatrical tale she dreamed up in private (involving dark dungeons, sneaking into forbidden rooms, the past slinking towards her—the usual tropes), Daddy told this story to her on an altogether boring day. She was not even old enough to wonder why her red-tinted hair and brown eyes could not be more different than the dark haired, large nosed Daddy, while her brother Caius was a living replica of a young Daddy. She rather liked her difference, to be quite honest, because she felt that this was the indisputable proof that she would be a heroine in some story or another.

Also their nose was slightly too large on a girl's face.

Of course, part of this carefree attitude was due to that she was not at the age to worry about legal inheritance. Life had shielded her from all of the logistical worries of the common people, and thus she would never think of these problems as anything but a romantic misadventure. Besides, given the extraordinarily luck that Daddy had—he was said to have the Midas Touch in the real estate sector—Arlene would not have been surprised if he managed to find the fountain of youth and lived forever.

She should really ask if he did have the elixir of life—she fancied that she saw it in some picture book when she was young, about some Nicolas Flamel's lifetime magical achievements.

Oh right, she was magical. A witch, but Arlene preferred the word 'magical'. 'Witch' sounded so…Wicked Witch of the West. Why, nobody ever remembered the _good_ witch Glinda.

Perhaps one of the reasons that Daddy preferred Arlene over his own flesh and blood, Caius, was because the magic in the Day lineage ended with Daddy: Daddy was a Squib, and Caius inherited nothing beyond good looks and smart wits. Arlene, on the other hand, inherited her full-fledged wizard father's penchant for magic. Daddy beamed with pride for a whole week when he discovered her troop of magical leaves marching in the backyard. Her magic was an unasked for talent, one that came easily and was forgotten about just as easily. She, of course, transferred to a proper wizardry prep school when the time came for it, but did not accept the move to Britain's best school. At eleven, her knowledge of England was embodied by the tales of a schoolmate who had moved from London, who had only spoken ever about drab weather, tasteless food, and rather rude people speaking in Cockney. So, as a willful child who wanted to stay in sunshine and drama, Arlene cried her way out of Hogwarts.

A conclusively futile endeavor in the end, but she did not know that yet as the chauffeur gently honked her awake from her musings.

Finally, home.

Arlene stepped out of the car when the footman opened the door and saw a man in a black suit hurriedly get into a stretch limousine. She recognized that man as Daddy's personal physician. He was a regular guest, as Daddy was very fretful of his wellbeing, as all overweight men tended to be. She wished her father had hired a paler, younger doctor though, perhaps with blonde hair and crinkling eyes—who was neighbor to a psychiatrist and fell in love with the patient's lulling voice.

As she walked into the mansion and up the spiral staircase, she heard her father's voice float toward her through the unlocked gilt-edged mahogany door. "Yes Rita, please book her a suite in the Mandarin Oriental Hyde Park, they have a nice location. And take care of the chauffeur and car, but please disregard any pleas she might make with you to get a Lambo or Aston. She's a terrible driver and it attracts too much attention. A nice Audi or Mercedes would do."

Arlene was not allowed sport cars, and she had acquired a taste for them precisely because of that. She would have remarked on how a Mercedes would stand out as well, if she was not so focused on trying to recall any recent vacation plans.

"Daddy," she started as soon as she heard the beep of phone that signaled end of dialogue, "Where are we going?"

Augustus, a middle-height man with neatly cut steel gray hair and perpetually in a three-piece pinstripe suit, old-fashioned suspenders, and a perfect tie (even at eight on a Saturday evening), turned around his leather chair and locked his hands together.

"Sugarplum," his tone was serious and left no room for argument, "This is not a vacation. I have arranged for you to transfer to Hogwarts in Scotland. There are some convoluted tax evasion maneuvers that I will spare you, but this is a final decision. Haven't you always talked about Scottish moors? You do remember Hogwarts, do you not?"

She did talk about moors, ever since playing the redbreast robin in her school's adaption of Burnett's _The Secret Garden_. She loved it so much, that later she read the actual book, one of the few novels that found their way into her hands. She justified it to her scoffing friends by saying who wouldn't love Dickon and his hands. Her friends, understandably, did not understand Arlene's fascination with a fictional character's hands.

And moors were innately romantic—look at _Wuthering Heights_! Oh the Bryonic Heathcliff!—to soothe his tortured, beastly soul! Well, Arlene never _read_ the book per se, but everybody _knew_ about it. It was required reading for school at some point, but of course the popular kids just watched the movie with plenty of vodka. Somebody's brother brought grass for everybody, but Arlene was just high on Timothy Dalton's morose gaze.

As knowledgeable as she was about Highland moors, Arlene had no idea what Hogwarts was though. She had no time for the less important things in life.

"I don't remember something of the sort," she professed, but knew very well that Daddy would fully explain it.

"You got a letter from them when you were eleven—our family came from a long line of British wizards," he said, forgetting momentarily that Arlene was not of his blood, "The British likes to call it the finest establishment, but they say that about all their facilities. It's been there since the 9th century though; I know you like old stuff."

"I do—is it in the moors?"

"No, somewhere more civilized—but you're taking a train from London. King's Cross, platform nine and three quarters, I believe."

"Nine and three quarters? How whimsical! When am I leaving?"

"Before the end of this month."

"So I don't have to worry about summer finals now," she responded rather cheerily.

She had always wanted to visit the British Isles! Daddy didn't believe in vacations, and only sent her and Caius off to the Alps for their annual, obligatory stay at their cabin. Arlene was terrible at skiing, so she always hated it. The British Isles, though, were another thing altogether.

Her knowledge of the world had expanded drastically since eleven, and her idea of the British was no longer shaped by that awful, misleading boy back in fourth grade. The land was filled with pitter-pattering rain and cats, shepherd's pie and gentlemanly boys, musty bookstores and idiosyncratic hills, gnomes if one squinted at the right angle, and perhaps even a few benevolent fairies. It would be such an escape from recent banality that had settled over her life! Her life was privileged, she knew, but one got sick of so much sunlight after a while. She was sure Hogwarts would prove to be a wonderful land, full of dark-haired and fair-hearted knights, gallant and splendid, eyes and swords flashing, rolling like thunder and scattering their enemies like a lion to mice.

It would be glorious!

"I'll go start packing my life right away," she declared.

Augustus looked upon his daughter with softened eyes. Her quick acceptance and lack of questions touched a father's heart, and he felt as if he should do something for her. "It seems to be the fad of the community there to keep some sort of a pet. Feel free to choose one once you get there. Just not a dog—dogs are so…" Frowning delicately in the way exclusively businessmen-like, Augustus mused before speaking, "doggish."

"Most certainly, they seem to define the very characteristic of doggishness!" Arlene smiled cheekily, and skipped away.

Augustus watched her receding figure before turning back to his papers.

**-.-.-**

We shall skip the part where Arlene was forced to pick out only _twenty_ pairs of shoes from her collection to take with her to London, and how she fervently made the housekeeper _promise_ she would ship the rest as soon as possible.

**-.-.-**

The plane ride was uneventful. She sat next to an aging businessman with slightly smelly feet, instead of any tall, dark stranger with a fascinating tale and a helpful hand with luggage. The flight stewardess was surprisingly strong though, and took care of all her bags. Once again, she struggled between the comfort of first class and the missed opportunity of meeting some poor farm boy with ruddy cheeks and frightful eyes during his first flight. Arlene decided, as always, that she might bring up flying coach to Daddy the next time.

London, however, took her breath away. All these houses! So quaint and so dismally brownstone-colored! It spoke of lonely curtains and a yellow fog that curled under the window certainly. As she looked out the car window, she found that there were fewer trench coats than she had anticipated.

Suddenly, in the middle of the most ordinary street, filled with ordinary (and therefore charming) English folk, the car braked. They stopped in front of a line of stores, mostly mom and pop shops of fish and chips. In in a small corner was an old, battered looking door with a swinging sign that said 'The Leaky Caldron' that swayed and creaked with some nonexistent wind.

"This is it, Miss," the chauffeur spoke in an adorable British accent.

"Thank you, Leon," she said to the chauffeur, "I'll have to go to that ice cream shop you recommend next time, and maybe bring your girlfriend too, I'm sure she's just as delightful as you are."

The chauffeur blushed, god bless him, and said, "You are too kind, Miss."

"Not at all," Arlene waved casually; she loved getting to know the lives of other people.

So, despite being surprised that she was supposed to step inside this grim looking tavern, Arlene nonetheless smoothed out her white-lace-sprawled sundress and shrugged on her teal wool coat—London was already a crisp, autumn weather so early in September, and Arlene was excited to actually make use of her collection of coats. She had been _dying_ to wear that new burnt mustard colored fleece-wool blend military inspired coat.

The interior was not any more impressive. The place looked like the concept art of a seedy bar in some movie. Arlene was disappointed by the crowd as well, as they treated her with more indifference than curiosity. She remembered what Daddy had told her painstakingly—at the back of the tavern, she must tap the bricks in a particular order to get into Diagon Alley. All the specificity made her feel like she was in some border ballad, and must perform Seven Herculean trials to save the prince in distress, she thought gleefully.

She wouldn't say no to a prince, after all.

The bricks shifted and opened before her, showing cobblestone roads and a charming Amish Mennonites village aura. The wizards and witches—in _robes_!—were merrily walking about.

She went to Ollivanders to have her wand polished—the small, beady old man scared her a little with his throaty whisper and slow caresses of her wand. He went on about seeing the oddest combination of rowan wood and kelpie mane hair—it made very nice swishy noises but was rigid like nothing else, long for her height at eleven inches, and the kelpie hair wasn't used in modern wandlore anymore. But Arlene was not paying attention, distracted by the reflection of herself in the window, and then a passing pedestrian who had a striking side profile—what a nose he had! She then went to the clothing shop Twilfitt and Tatting's, coming out with a much lighter purse and a slight distaste for the elite class of the wizarding world. Apparently _Americans_ were not suitable company for the Lestrange youths of society.

But of course, every heroine needed a nemesis—or a whole social class of them.

To shake out the unpleasant surprise, Arlene went to the pet shop the Magical Menagerie after picking up a bag of sugarplums.

She was determined to get a cat. It was by far the most impractical pet—some would use the word 'useless'—for they had almost no magical properties like the fire crab, nor any utilitarian uses like the owl. Because of this, it was also the least common of all pets—if she could not get something grandiose, like, oh a golden phoenix, then a cuddly cat would do.

The pet store was stacked with cramped cages, most beastly eyes on Arlene as she walked in. A large selection of rats and toads were in the store, and not as many cats, as suspected.

_Poor creatures_, Arlene sighed as she silently mused, _these are sights that would do good to anyone with the smallest sympathy in their hearts_. She was moved beyond words, and was certain that she would forget it as soon as she walked out of the doors.

In the back, she found a flame Ragdoll kitten, looking very much like a fluffier version of a Siamese, curled up. It nuzzled Arlene's hand when she tried to feed it a sugarplum, and Arlene immediately took the cage to the counter.

The counter was empty, with a 'Be Back Soon' card haphazardly thrown on the surface, but Arlene was happy to wait. A boy close to her age was also waiting for the salesperson. There was something particularly aesthetically pleasing about him, with pallor like he had never taken a stroll in the sun, a head of choppy brown hair, and boy-eyes that were soft and blue. Why he looked like he would make a perfect Michael Darling in a production of Peter Pan, she thought. Arlene muffled a laugh as she thought of putting the wiry boy in large striped pajamas printed with cats. He would look good in them, she imagined.

The sound of her laughter gathered his attention, and he turned to smile bashfully at her. His eyes were clear like Kashmir sapphires, and she could almost see herself suspended in the reflective liquid of his pupils. A boy with those eyes could only be genteel and poetic; she took an immediate liking to him.

Arlene greeted him with an easy and bright smile and went to set the cage on the desk. Getting no response and without a further conversation to fill the silence, Arlene lowered her head to dig in her bag for her wallet. She frowned as she looked inside.

"Alright," the boy greeted in an endearingly soft accent, then asked at her frown, "Something the matter?"

"Good afternoon," she heaved a sigh, "It seems that I have underestimated my spending powers, and so hadn't brought enough wizard gold."

"Gringotts is right around the corner," he offered, and after a moment's observation of her Muggle attire, "The bank, that is."

"But what if the kitten is taken when I'm gone?" She despaired, "It might take a while to sort through all the security and exchange stuff, and I have already pledged my love undying and solely to this one here!"

The boy smiled amusedly at her melodrama and dug inside his pockets. "I have a bit of money here—my friend asked me to help him get some stuff for his owl. If you take this to pay, you can get the money and repay me back."

Arlene felt her heart swell at his act of kindness. She would have just asked the salesperson to reserve the cat for her, but she would not turn down a nice gesture from such a nice Michael Darling. "Oh there _is_ goodness in the world! The price tag is twelve galleons, and here," she flipped her wallet and let the contents pour out onto the desk, "I'll leave this here for when I'm off."

The boy stared at the table. A rather large amount of cash and a few credit cards have made a small heap on the surface, and he gave a wry smile. "This would be more than enough, you should take some back."

"No bother, I'll be right back."

"Aren't you worried that I might make off with your 'deposit' here and gain a profit from this?"

"Nonsense, who would choose such a meager profit over the eternal gratitude of a girl and her cat?"

He chuckled at her joke, not understanding that Arlene meant it when she said a 'meager profit'—modesty was never a strong virtue of hers.

She then hurried to the bank and dealt with old-fashioned goblins who took half a century to get her money. When she rushed back, however, the boy was gone. There was a woman behind the counter now, and upon seeing the cat in arms, she said, "Oh you're the customer who didn't have enough money right? The boy left the extra change for you—his friends came to get him and he had to go. He told me to tell you that."

"Oh," Arlene rearranged the leftover bills into her wallet, strangely disappointed. Perhaps she had been more earnest in her wish to put on a production of _Peter Pan_ than she had originally thought. _Oh well_, Arlene resigned as she paid—she had lived through bigger disappointments.

_._

_No matter, some things were meant to happen._

* * *

What odd people—Remus thought as he was beckoned away by his mates—the American waters raised.

* * *

Note: '_he passes the nights singing like a solitary sparrow_' is a line from Giovanni Verga's short story (Rustic Chivalry) that he turned into a play, which in turn was put to libertto and became the famous opera known as _Cavalleria rusticana_.


	2. The Bourgeois Gentleman

A/N: I don't think Hogwarts actually allow transfer/exchange students, and even if they did, I'm sure the process would be better/more logical. But I ask for suspense of belief, because let's forget the logistics and let Arlene have her fun, no? XD

* * *

**Chapter 2 **

**The Bourgeois Gentleman**

_- come, come into this room, sit there and wait until he comes -_

The train station was packed with people, but few had a fluffy kitten in their arms and a trolley pushed by a footman.

That would be Arlene. She was in a pistachio green sundress (with pockets! how utilitarian of her!), a cool-toned coffee cardigan, white fingerless gloves, brown suede low heels, and white-rimmed sunglasses. She thought she looked the right amount of girl-next-door—approachable, but not overtly so—and the heels were comfortable enough to walk the whole of King's Station in.

Speaking of which…There was platform nine, and there platform ten, but she was to go to platform nine and three quarters? Arlene remembered vaguely of a wall or something to run into, but could not see anything peculiar with, well, anything… Oh, if only she had paid more attention to the Daddy's directions of actually getting there, and less on her vision of the sweeping moors! In any case, the footman could not see this, so she tipped and dismissed him, taking control of the trolley herself. My, wasn't it a hard to maneuver piece of equipment!

"Watch out!" a shout came behind her, and someone pushed past her, without so much as a sorry. People could be _so_ uncouth, Arlene thought with disdain as her eyes followed the girl reproachfully, which was when the girl ran into a ticket barrier—and vanished! It was unquestionably _magical_. So Arlene followed her example, smartly pushing the trolley in front of her in case of any resistance. She felt none, however, and soon saw the large sign of Hogwarts Express, and a whimsically antiquated train.

Well, onto the next challenge then.

After ridding herself of her luggage, Arlene walked onto the train, and wondered where she should sit. She knew not a single soul on this train, and although normally that would not have deterred her, she was not in a mood for small talk. A nap would be nice, she decided, with her Ragdoll kitten, and the rolling countryside view. So when she found a compartment that had no noise coming from it, a drastic difference from the other wailing, rumbling ones, she pushed the door open with the relief of finally finding an empty space to rest her feet.

Except that it wasn't empty.

Two girls and two boys filled the seats neatly, each gender taking one side. They all wore emerald and silver robes, and Arlene frowned at her pistachio dress clashing with their emerald. Their faces were grim as they lifted their heads from the books they were writing in. Arlene was surprised at all the unspoken hostility, and quickly closed the door, only afterwards remembering her manners. She gave a breathy 'sorry' to the door, and quickly went away. They looked young anyway, young enough for her to never cross path with them again at school.

She was walking down the corridors when the door immediately to her left opened without warning, and a girl with a delightful mass of red hair raged out. She seemed to have a temper as bad as Demeter did when she froze the earth in winter. "You are such a sodding _toerag_, Potter!"

"Am I now?" a male voice teased from inside.

"Couldn't you be more inclusive of other students?"

"I didn't say anything against _you_ sitting here, did I?" The same voice continued, apparently not worried about the consequences of the girl blowing up even more. A rather unwise voice, Arlene concluded.

"Ugh! Boys!" The girl was about to slam to the door when she saw Arlene.

Arlene could only give her a somewhat weak smile. All the people she met today seemed to be awfully hostile, and in differing manners of hostility too. If this was what the population of Hogwarts was like—

"You!" The redhead took one look at her and cried out, "You're the transfer student right?"

"Why, yes, I'm Arlene Day, from—". Before she could say anything more, the redhead pushed her into the compartment and ordered, "Potter! Be a decent human being for once, before Remus comes back from Prefect patrols!"

The door closed behind Arlene, and she was left alone with these three boys. One was looking at her with frustrated interest and had a shock of black hair and rather old-fashioned horn-rimmed glasses—good jaw structure, Arlene decided. Another was small and portly, and looked at her with the same lost sense that she felt right now—a few years too old to pull off the baby fat cheeks. The last one, with and intensely gray eyes and messy hair that some might call sex hair, just stared out the window in a blasé manner—he was either deaf or was posing, which was a shame, given his lovely side profile.

"So," Arlene began, and hoped that somebody might finish it for her.

The blasé-boy just gave her a flickering glance—which was _condescending_ if a glance could be so—and went back to the window.

Definitely posing. She disliked him immediately.

"So mind if I sit here?" She gestured to the empty seat next to the mousy-boy with dirty blonde hair. His pudgy, unattractive face looked out of place with his companions, so Arlene figured that he must be wickedly funny. Perhaps an Oscar Wilde with an unfortunate face and figure, she thought pityingly.

"Oh," The glasses-boy seemed to recover himself and flashed her a rather friendly smile. "Sure thing. Despite what Evans said, I'm a positively _charming_ human being, most of the time. The name's James, James Potter. This is Peter Pettigrew, and that bloke," he pointed to the blasé-boy _still_ pretending to not notice her, "is Sirius Black."

Something about the way he said it made Arlene feel like those names _meant_ something. Maybe they were a group of outlaws who merrily punished the evil like Robin Hood, or maybe they were a boy band famous in the wizarding world whose mere faces made girls faint. In any case, she just smiled prettily and introduced herself in return, "Arlene Day, delighted. As Evans—I presume—said, I'm a transfer from Beverly Hills."

She also said that with an expectation of them knowing what that meant, and was greeted by the same silence. Not sensing any acknowledgement, she asked with innocent curiosity, "None of you Muggleborn, huh?"

She got the attention of the blasé-boy now. He narrowed his eyes at her, gave her an once-over, and said curtly, "No."

_Whoa_. Hostility indeed. "No wonder," she muttered to herself.

"Sorry, didn't catch that," glasses-boy—he said James, right?—also narrowed his eyes.

"Oh, just that thought there would be more diversity here. I'd have been surprised if a Muggleborn didn't know Beverly Hills." She gave a small chuckle that plopped into the silence.

They seemed more relaxed at her answer though, and James flashed her a smile again. She clearly said _something_ right.

Mousy-boy then asked, "So, where is it?"

Blasé-boy turned inside fully this time and smacked him in the arm, "Allowing people to know that you don't know whatever it is that you don't know is positively a _crime_."

Mousy-boy—Pete? Peter?—seemed to be accustomed to such behavior from the blasé-boy, and simply shrugged and repeated his question, "Where is it?"

A voice not her own answered. "In the land of sunshine, where countless Muggle movie stars and a few magical ones reside, where the pawnshops make quick loans on million-dollar racecars and multiple credit cards hit their limit on one shopping spree." The door opened again to show the gentleman-boy Arlene met in Diagon Alley. He walked in, with a badge on his threadbare black robe that glittered scarlet and gold.

In the broad daylight, she could see him better. His skin still lacked the kisses of the sun, and did not have the moonlit-glow look that blasé-boy did, but there was a light dusting of freckles over his nose, faint and barely there. The tip of his nose was round, and on his face of sixteen years, gave him a boyish look. His eyebrows were a little too light for his brown hair, but the acute clarity in his blue eyes compensated for that. Instead of Michael Darling in _Peter Pan_, he now looked like he should be casted for The Little Prince in _The Little Prince and the Aviator_.

The Little Prince himself, on the other hand, simply raised his eyebrows and gave a soft "Oh".

Arlene thought it was such a perfect syllable, curled and gliding.

Then he remembered his manners, "Hullo."

"Hello to you as well."

James looked forth and back at them two as he scouted toward the blasé-boy to make room, who said, "Why Remus old chap, already know the new girl in town?"

The Little Prince sat down across from Arlene and nodded.

"Well, 'know' might be too strong a word," Arlene explained, "This gentleman here exchanged some galleons with me so that I could buy my cat here," she lifted the ragdoll cat and it meowed grumpily in response to being moved from the snug corner of her left arm.

"So what did you name your cat?" The Little Prince asked before his friends could burst into questions.

"Garfield." Arlene said hastily. She had the awareness to be a little embarrassed by the name, but was overall happy that he asked.

To her surprise, The Little Prince chuckled a little—whereas the others had no reaction, being too completely removed from the Muggle world—and petted Garfield as if it was the most sensible name for a cat. "Something for him to aspire to. Him?"

"Yes, it's a he."

"I'm Remus Lupin, by the way," he extended his hand out, and she shook it with a strong grip. What did Daddy always say again?—a strong grip meant a strong character.

"Arlene Day." She wished she had some witty introduction of herself; maybe some pun about Day and Night, or a poetic allusion for her name. It was not often that she felt the pressing need to impress, so she was a little lost at this sensation.

Thankfully, the snack trolley arrived, and if Remus noticed her distinct lack of wit, he did not comment. James, Pete, and blasé-boy were all shamelessly picking out their favorite sweets—what sixteen-year-old could refrain from transforming into hungry monsters in the face of all this sugar?

Arlene lost sight of Remus. She thought he was still seated strangely enough, but couldn't be sure. To avoid being crushed by the increasingly active snack-seeking, she stood up and looked at the selection as well. Now she could see why they were all so excited. It was practically a small candy store packed in a trolley.

Remus was indeed sitting: he either did not care for sweets, or his threadbare robe said more about his life than he probably would have liked for others to know. Arlene was struck by a sudden desire to buy him something, a charitable urge, or perhaps just wanting to see him smile. Subtly, of course, for a lady must have her discretion.

"I'll take half of everything," she told the lady, feeling at once comfortable now that she was drawing upon her purchasing power, a source much more familiar than any magic.

Things froze for a split second, before the blasé-boy started clapping. It seemed like earning his elusive approval was no harder than just being gluttonous, how very _boyish_. "Pick what you guys like," she said generously, careful to not look at Remus just yet, "I don't know what's good here."

In a moment, they were all digging through the piles, even more passionately than before, if that was possible.

Remus, however, still did not move. Arlene by now was second guessing herself; perhaps he really just did not have a sweet tooth. So she asked him, "Not a fan of sweets? How very old-fashioned of you," careful to make it a vague compliment if indeed it was true.

He smiled and shook his head. Arlene couldn't tell if he was saying no to liking sweets or being old-fashioned.

"You know, I really wouldn't judge you if you took a few—a sweet tooth becomes a man the same way a liking of cooking does. And really, there are far too many for me to try out and eat, and if I leave the rest to Garfield—well, he might earn his namesake slightly too soon for his health."

"Then," he hesitatingly began, "would you mind if I took a few of the chocolates? I am… quite fond of them."

"By all means," Arlene smiled happily, "Leave none for the rest of them, it was you who helped me out, after all."

He took a chocolate frog and nibbled at it happily, and Arlene shared his happiness to the very last, squirming bite.

_._

_You don't know it yet, but this is it, the beginning._

* * *

Remus had seldom seen a person as generous as this bird, even if her eyes glinted a little too much when she looked at him. All could be forgotten as the bittersweet tang of dark chocolate melted on his tongue though—he was only a sixteen year old bloke, after all, and if somebody wanted to give him an unlimited quantity of chocolate, let it not be him to ask why.

* * *

Note: '_come, come into this room, sit there and wait until he comes' _is the first line to Molière's play, _Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme_ (The Bourgeois Gentleman/The Middle-Class Gentleman), as translated by Philip Jones.


	3. The Lady of the Lake

**Chapter 3**

**The Lady of the Lake**

_- the silver light, with quivering glance, / played on the water's still expanse -_

The Hogwarts Express train stopped sometime after midnight, jolting blasé-boy and Pete awake, and stopping the steady flow of conversation that Arlene had kept up with Remus and James. At that point she had already learned that James was from southeastern England (Kent, which didn't mean anything to Arlene, but she was eager to hear James talk about it). Apparently it was a rich, homogenous neighborhood, and Arlene was quick to point out the similarities in their childhood environments. His parents were very well-off, and made him a throne of doting love—which explained the natural air of affluence that Arlene was at ease with. He liked Quidditch—a rather roguish sport that the Brits were enamored with, as she recalled—and gave a ten-minute monologue on the charms of flying and his abilities of catching some ball or other. He reminded her of the football quarterback from back home, except funnier and definitely more likable.

Pete turned out to be from London, surprisingly—but Greater London, which explained his lack of city sophistication. Not that he didn't have manners or dressed shabbily, but he didn't carry himself with the same matter-of-fact confidence as James or, as much as she didn't want to admit it, the graces of the blasé-boy.

She expected that theblasé-boy came from somewhere _bohemian_, like Soho. She had asked briskly about him when the conversation lulled at a certain point, and was followed a terse sentence from James pronouncing him to be from Islington and a look that was every bit a warning to never inquire about his family. Arlene was not inclined to inquire _anything_ about that boy until James raised her natural curiosity. She could sense secrets from the core of her bones, and she knew this was one that she had to work for. Hogwarts was already promising to be interesting.

Now Remus—oh Remus was from _Swansea_. The moment she heard the name of his hometown, she nearly swooned at the beauty of it. He said he didn't live in the urban parts of Swansea though, not with the long beaches and glittering skylines. He said his family took root in the rural parts, at the foot of the Black Mountain, close enough to the Llyn y Fan Fach* Lake to go ice fishing whenever it got cold enough for that. He said that his mother was a Muggle-born, but from his father he inherited the old, Welsh magic line. He said not much ever happened around those parts, except an occasional wild animal would intrude their home, but he had never seen the famed Twrch Trwyth** boar from the Arthurian legends (Arlene had never heard of Twrch Trwyth but she didn't break up his flow of luminous words). He said he missed home awfully, but was glad that the summer was over. Arlene noticed the quick, sympathetic glance he spared at one of the sleeping figures, but did not comment.

She was lost in her Imaginarium.

She could see his life now: it was an old, old house, along the spanning moors that embraced the Black Mountains, built on old soil tainted with copper. (Were moors even rich in copper?—it hardly mattered, the thought was romantic enough.) She could see the massif drained by capillary rivers, leading to the lake the he had mentioned. Although she had no idea where the lake was, or even what its name meant, but it was still a _beautiful_ name, just as beautiful as everything else he named. She could see that he was _poor_—the denim threads in his jeans under his robe were indistinguishable from washing, the crew neckline of his shirt so ancient that it was making a comeback in fashion again, his shoes barely had any heel from wear, and the camouflaging patches at his elbows held a remarkable precision that only came from practice.

Those details told entire stories, and she could tell from a single glance that he was poor. His window was probably leaky; his room small and strangely shaped and drafty and cozy and smelled like soap; his food starch-heavy and protein-light; his mother less attractive on account of domestic duties washing away her previous beauty. His days would be filled with books carted from the library when they disposed of certain selections, and a romance that only the poor could afford.

He must have some tragically common story of struggle and perseverance, and Arlene thought that it was _quite_ perfect. She had never met somebody so sophisticated in their poverty—not that she had met more than a handful of non-wealthy people in her days, mind you.

When the train ride ended—for end it must—Arlene had learned a great deal of James's life story and geography of Welsh moors. She had a knack of getting people to talk about themselves, and then make it about _herself_.

They stopped moving, and James took the cue to whack the sleeping boys awake with great satisfaction, and Remus to pack away the book that he never got to read. As the four boys stepped out the compartment, Arlene smoothed out the pleats of her dress, adjusted the collar of her cardigan, and followed them out into the night.

The largest man Arlene had ever laid eyes on stood by the head of the train, tall and bushy-looking, with beady eyes and a ferocious beard that looked like it bred spiders in its frizzy depth. He hollered for all the first years to follow him, and then after a moment, also bellowed Arlene's name. She bade a rueful goodbye to the group of boys and headed toward the towering man. She was a little intimidated, mostly by his massive beard, but he sheepishly apologized for almost forgetting her ('Blimey, I haven't even known we _took_ transfers!'). The giant man turned out to be surprisingly gentle and friendly.

Boats lined up neatly along the edge of the lake. Hagrid (the giant man that she befriended quickly, being among the small group of students not frightened wordless) had indicated for her to come with him to the first boat.

"Yer first time seeing Hogwarts, eh?" He started conversationally as the boat drifted onto the water with a listless leisure that surprised Arlene. She had expected more urgency, more efficiency.

"Yes, I know absolutely nothing of it—which makes it absolutely fascinating! I wasn't even able to find an illustration of this place! I've heard that it's _grand_ though."

"Best place on earth, ye'll see soon enough, best place on earth." He spoke with an unusual amount of pride, as if he was somehow personally vested in the place. Perhaps he was a teacher here? His jacket could not have fitted any dress code, but perhaps the Scottish was more lenient with fashion faux pas. "It's right around the corner, just ye wait," he turned and beamed forward into the darkness, "There!"

Before her, glowing out of the thick night was Hogwarts Castle, looming with its tall spires and rounding arches, rising in its thousand years of oldness and pensiveness, invincible from all harm, indestructible in every stone, incomprehensible in its strength. The castle itself seemed to have a spine of steel, standing so straight that it seemed to reach the point of bending.

Arlene hid her gasp among the 'ooh's and 'ahh's of the first years.

She was trembling, and it was not from the chills of the waters. America was a great country, and Arlene loved it with all the patriotism in her heart—her capacity for patriotism extended greatly by the intense cheerleading for her school team—but England had the unnecessary grandeur that came with long history.

"Blimey, still takes my breath away every time. Bit chilly though, eh? Most folks don't anticipate the Scotland winds." Hagrid was either helping her keep up her facade of worldliness, or he was just completely clueless. Arlene hoped that it was the latter.

"Oh no, I just came straight from California, the land of sunshine and people tanning."

"Would have done ye good to put on a robe."

"My old school had a very… lax dress code." They only had one if you counted the mini skirt competition between the girls to see who showed the most leg. "So I hadn't thought to bring clothes to change on the way."

"Bring some next time though, some nights them naiads make winds like hell," here he covered his mouth and shrunk a little, "Oops, sorry laddies, that was a bad word."

He was such a sweetheart—one of those people who will probably end up romantically lonely with the love of a thousand docile pets and possibly a dozen not-quite-docile ones. A sweetheart nonetheless, and Arlene liked him all the more for it.

A kid somewhere, with a beautiful head of platinum blond hair, rolled her eyes and sneered. What beautiful, Hollywood hair, Arlene clucked pitifully, to on be wasted such a bratty head. She was, however, extremely interested in these naiads: "Naiads? Water nymphs? Are they awfully mischievous?"

Hagrid shook his mane, "Not mischievous, they like to lure men down with singin'."

"How fascinatingly horrid!" Arlene felt like she was really stepping into a fairy tale, with a castle looming over her, sailing on a dark liquid lake with winds created by man-eating mermaids. Wasn't this the start—or the trials, or something—of Beauty and the Beauty, or East of the Sun and West of the Moon?

"They don't venture far from the Forbidden Forest though, and not even there in recent years." Then he remembered something, "No sneaking into the Forest, yous, ye hear? No even _thinking_ about it!"

In her excitement over naiads, Arlene had forgotten to ask about what trails she would face in the castle, and was soon in for a surprise.

_._

_All good things begin with a trial and an error, as we know now._

* * *

Remus the Prefect had to admit, he was a little worried about the bird as she stepped into the boat that would rock her life, if only because she obviously did not know how to worry for herself.

* * *

Notes: _'The silver light, with quivering glance, / Played on the water's still expanse'_ is a line from the first canto of Sir Walter Scott's poem, _The Lady of the Lake._ It is the basis for _La donna del lago_ (The Lady of the Lake), an opera by Gioachino Rossini with a libretto by Andrea Leone Tottola.

*Llyn y Fan Fach: Welsh for 'lake of the small peak', associated with the Lake of the Lake legend. Also a local legend tells of the Lady of Llyn y Fan Fach to be the mother of the Physicians of Myddfai, famous doctors with numerous formulas still in Welsh manuscripts today. Fitting since they also have a lake.

**Twrch Trwyth: Welsh for 'the boar Trwyth', an enchanted wild boar. In Welsh mythology, a hero who served Arthur had to get a comb so that his girl can marry him. The magical boar had this comb, so Arthur set out to Wales to hunt it, eventually obtaining the comb and drowning the boar in the Irish Sea. Kind of morbid.

* * *

A/N: Not a lot of Remus (or Sirius or James) action at this point, but the Marauders are a rather exclusive bunch, no? She'll have to work to talk to them!

Also, as I have never been to Wales, there is a lot of Wikipedia research. Please correct me if anything is wrong!


	4. Pygmalion

**Chapter 4**

**Pygmalion**

_- if I can't have kindness, I'll have independence -_

Arlene had assumed that they would have a nice feast and be on their merry ways, but instead, they were all led to wait outside in the hallway. Nervous chatter spread like wildfire through the crowd of young heads so much shorter than her, and she felt a social awkwardness that she had never felt before—she never particularly cared for children, and she was sixteen now, and _not_ a child.

The chatter broke when a stern looking woman came about. She had a tall witch's hat on, slightly lopsided as if to make a point, and wore a slight frown. Her frown deepened significantly when she took in Arlene's attire, as only a professor could. She was tapping her pale fingers, long and all bones. Arlene wanted to tell her that the way she was puckering her lips in annoyance would bring wrinkles, and soon enough she would look like a hundred and ninety years old. But of course Arlene knew that was not proper etiquette, so she checked herself and only looked at the woman rather sympathetically. No matter, she was one of those people who looked old before they were, anyhow. Besides, it would appear that she had already displeased the professor with her unusual attire—Arlene thought she looked rather pretty, but she suppose pretty wasn't exactly what the teacher was looking for.

"Quiet now," the professor snapped out, her voice sharp and shrill, cutting the sudden silence. "I am Professor McGonagall, and will assist in your Sorting. If you would please keep your lines and follow me."

Ah, McGonagall was one of those people that said 'please' like a command. Arlene hoped that the professor did not teach a mandatory class—she had a suspicion that her usual charms would not talk this professor into raising her grades.

The large doors opened for McGonagall, slowly revealing a gargantuan hall, filled with black robed youths with their eyes all turned toward them.

Now Arlene felt like she was in her element again.

She walked in line, her heels clicking the floor briskly. The roof atop was dazzling with stars—either a spell to create transparent stones or bewitched to show the constellations. It could have gone gimmicky, Arlene thought, but they carried out the Organic Architecture concept admirably well. At the very front of the room, an elevated platform raised two long tables with—she presumed—all the professors there. In the center, instead of a person, was a stool, with a floppy, timeworn hat on top of it.

Arlene was confused. Her confusion was heightened when she caught the eye of an old man with a gray beard—principal?—and thought that he _winked_ at her. But then again, his eyes were the kind that always looked like they were winking under those bushy gray eyebrows, so perhaps it was a trick of the light.

Arlene had to remind herself to keep her composure when suddenly the hat _sprouted a mouth_ and started _singing._

It was some song about tradition and Arlene found it rather vainglorious actually, for its song begun with an ode to its own smartness. She spaced out as she thought about the various purposes that one could have for a singing minstrel of a hat.

Before she knew it, the hat fell silent and McGonagall climbed onto the platform, taking out a long scroll that pooled around her feet like cascading fabric.

"Aaron, Abe," she called out.

A nervous looking boy stepped out from the crowd and climbed clumsily onto the platform. As he put thehat on his head, it hollered out with barely concealed glee, "Hufflepuff!"

The section to her left clapped and whooped, bundles of youthful pride. Judging by the color schemes and hanging flags, Arlene figured that they were different houses—four of them, apparently. And the _hat_ somehow decided where they would end up.

Well wasn't _that_ just the cat's pajamas. A talking hat deciding out the rest of her life (two years, a forever in its own right)! Arlene was not very comfortable with this idea. She grew less comfortable as the hat took longer with some other kids, muttering menacingly to them. She wondered if it had a test prepared.

Oh dear. She _really_ should have asked Daddy more about this place. Daddy wouldn't have had much experience, she supposed, being a Squib and all, but apparently he _did_ come from a long and venerable line of pureblooded nobles. He fled when he did not receive _any_ letters of acceptance at eleven, his mother mortified to death—literally—but being the only heir, inherited all her money anyhow. He told all the interviewers that he was a self-made man, but that was just a white lie for glossy magazine covers.

What if the hat asked about history? Or _geography_? Those were her worst subjects. At least she didn't have to practice any _actual_ magic, it would seem. Arlene did not practice magic very much, the repetition almost as boring as reading about dead wizards in her opinion. She was told she had great potential in magic, but magical abilities were not how one was socially judged back home. Also she had been told that she had great potential in many, many things, and it had taken her thirteen years to figure out that the only thing she was good at was gossiping—an art of speech in its own right, really. She was also decent at theater, although not so much the _acting_ part as the _lighting_ and _design_ part. Perhaps the hat would ask her something about how colors appeared under a cool-toned light as opposed a warm-toned glow?

"Day, Arlene."

Oh and she knew _nothing_ about the different houses! Suppose she ended up in a bad one? She did not want to be in a house that didn't win at sports, that wouldn't do at all. Maybe she should give the hat a quick cleansing charm? She could hardly tell what color it was supposed to be—but oh, the professor looked downright _murderous_ so she supposed she could just wash her hair later. Goodness it was heavier than it looked! Oh and it would be nice if she got to live in one of those tower-spire things. She could imagine herself as Rapunzel, albeit with auburn hair that didn't reach her waist yet.

"My, my, you already know where you're going, don't you?"

Arlene was startled when the hat chuckled as it engulfed her hair, murmuring into her ears in a way less like a lover, and more like a loving old grandfather. She wished she had a doting grandfather to tell her stories about bygone days and when he was a young dashing soldier—

"Pull your thoughts together, dearie, this _is_ somewhat important."

Sorry, she thought, and wondered briefly if he could hear her thoughts.

"That I can."

Oh sorry then, she apologized mentally again, her mind had a habit of wandering when her nerves were strung.

"Had worse reactions. A boy puked—by flipping me over and the bile ended up all inside of me.

_Ew_.

"Yes, my thoughts then precisely. In any case, I see that you have quite a determination to follow that unruly group of boys."

Oh, she thought, oh the perfectly poor Remus and the quarterback-like James, and the sheepish Pete and the annoying blasé-boy. Oh yes, she would very much like to be 'sorted' into the same place, but she had no idea where—

"Gryffindor."

Gryffindor, what a lovely, valiant name!

"A pity actually. You think like a Hufflepuff but judge yourself a Slytherin. Absolutely not a Ravenclaw, no motivation in you at all. Strangely you would fit better with the Slytherins than the Hufflepuffs, despite your nature."

_Gryffindor_, she thought very hard.

It chuckled again, "Don't fret dearie, Gryffindor is a perfectly fine choice. They _are_ the melting pot of the houses, taking in anybody and making them a Gryffindor eventually. All they have to be is brave."

Oh _dear_, she continued fretting, she was not brave _at all_, that much she knew. But what was bravery anyways? A slowness in processing danger often looked like bravery, and so did the momentary passion. She definitely preferred to work on her bravery than studiousness, which Ravenclaw sounded to embody. They were probably nerdy anyway, she thought with a bit of vengeance.

"We'll work on your tendency to disapprove as well. So you've decided?"

Yes, she decided—she didn't like how the Hat thought she was Hufflepuff, whatever it stood for—

"Loyalty."

Oh, well that was a nice trait. And Slytherin?

The Hat sighed, "You didn't hear any bit of my song did you?"

Sorry, Arlene apologized for the third time. She wasn't used to apologizing so often.

"It's quite alright, as long as no puking is involved. Slyterins are cunning—"

Ooh, she _was_ cunning!

"—Like I said, fancies yourself a Slytherin. No matter, you know what you want."

Yes, Arlene thought proudly. If she had one good trait it was that she always knew what she wanted, and right now it was to be in—

"GRYFFINDOR!" It bellowed out to the floor below.

Arlene put the dear old Hat down, said yet another goodbye—she had gotten through as many goodbyes and apologies tonight, wasn't the night supposed to be of new _beginnings_? Despite his scruffiness, she decided that he was a lovable old man. She wouldn't mind if he was her grandfather.

Gryffindor—the house of scarlet and gold, she looked good in those colors, it was a good choice—welcomed her with loud applause and not a few cheeky grins. Arlene grinned back at them and fleetingly wondered if her eyeliner was smudged.

The senior students had taken their seats before, and clustered as she had expected. The sporadic empty seats among them seemed to be left intentionally vacant for younger siblings, so Arlene took her dutiful seat at the border where the first years met the non-first years.

The moment she sat down though, half of the eyes around the table were on her.

"Hullo. So transfer student huh? Fancy that, didn't know we took transfers." A boy with ruddy cheeks remarked to her left.

"There was that French girl from Beauxbatons Academy, remember? Cried her way home after Lestrange hexed warts on her face. Thought they were _permanent_," the wispy-blond boy next to him threw in his thoughts. The both of them looked vaguely mid-teen, so Arlene thought they might be Sixth Years like herself.

"So not many transfers, I take? Well here's your chance to tell me everything about the place."

"Why dontcha tell us about yourself first? Where are you from?" Ruddy-cheeks asked her.

"_Beverly Hills_," a voice down the table yelled out.

McGonagall paused and clinked her glass once.

James—for it had been James who did the yelling—flashed her a winning smile and continued in a quieter tone. "And don't tell me you guys don't know where _that_ is!"

Arlene chuckled at his childish assertion of knowledge, and did not point out that he didn't just a few hours ago. "West coast of America is all anybody needs to know about the place. Thought I'd trade some surfing waves for the fresh mountain air."

"Oh air is about all you're getting here," wispy-blond grumbled through a mouthful of chicken.

"What he means is, not a lot around these parts," ruddy-cheeks helped out.

"Nonsense!" This time it was blasé-boy who did the yelling. The group was actually closer than she had thought, only two seats away from her. "Never a dull day around with us around!"

"Yes, I'm sure that you lead the life of Sean Connery in the James Bond movies, but there must be more to this palace than your bravado?"

"_Palace_," somebody made fun of her down the table, and she ignored it.

"Sean who? James what?" There were many confused faces around the table, and Arlene immediately knew who here had Muggle upbringing.

"You a halfblood?" wispy-blond asked her, in a carefully neutral tone.

"Nah, I'm a pureblood, but the wizarding community of Beverly Hills blends with the Muggles exceedingly well." Since she had no idea who her father was, she just made herself pureblooded for convenience's sake. She was not so sheltered that she missed the blood mania going around, and wanted no trouble from her background. Not Slytherin her _ass_—take that Grandfather Hat!

She could be whatever she wanted to do be.

"Ah," then quickly, "Not that I mind of course." Wispy-blond wiped his hand on his robe rather carelessly and extended his hand across ruddy-cheeks. "Emil, Emil Lowell."

"Arlene Day, if you happened to miss McGonagall's extraordinarily pitched announcement."

Blond Emil gave her a small smile, and Arlene wondered if he smiled at all usually.

"And I'm Karol Barnes," ruddy-cheeks also introduced himself.

This led to a frenzy of introductions around her, and she soon forgot all their names.

"Oh goodness," she laughed good-naturedly, "This is like my first exam here. I can hardly see straight after this onslaught of name-attacks."

"The British are not well known for their conversation outside of weather commenting," Remus smiled good-naturedly from across blasé-boy.

Emil and—Karol was it?—and maybe Ester or Estelle, and Nanaly or Natalie—in any case, these people were somewhat surprised by Remus speaking up. Ron or Donald or something to her right seemed to not share in the surprise though, but that was because he was a first year and did not know Remus _like she did_.

She felt triumphant for no reason at all.

"And the Americans are not known for their good cutlery manners. So excuse me if I make a fool of myself right now," as she dug into the roast grouse with perfect dinner etiquette. It must have looked wrong to them though, because Arlene could not remember how the European styled etiquette went. Such a pity, she thought, that one of the more useful things Daddy drilled into her was not appreciated.

The feast ended with another Dumbledore speech—Dumbledore was the principle with the twinkles in his eyes, Arlene was quickly informed, who owned a phoenix and knew every happening in and out of Hogwarts. The old man had become a shining idol to Arlene in a few words.

She was introduced to the Fat Lady, who took an immediate liking to her when she complimented the hue of her dress, and how beautifully it matched the rosé wine. The password, as it turned out, was Grapes of Wrath. She remembered Caius, her brother, telling her about it as part of his high school readings, but she couldn't recall what it was about.

It was late, and everybody went up to their rooms to unpack their lives for the next school year.

When she made her way up to her assigned room, Arlene found that she got the bed in the corner by default. The curtains smelled faintly like tobacco, but what really bothered Arlene was the large crack that ran along the bedpost.

She didn't like it one bit. She pulled out her wand and did a quick _Reparo_, and was amazed as the crack manifested itself even wider.

"It's no use," a girl drawled from the bed beside hers, "Every time you try to repair it, it just grows another damned inch."

The speaker was a platinum blonde girl with steely gray eyes. The bridge of her nose looked like it was carved out of stone, and it told of centuries of inbreeding. Her robe was embroidered at the edges and the duffel bag on her bed had large, flourishing letters that said 'Anise A. Nott' on it. Definitely aristocratic then. Her eyebrows were low and straight and made her look fiercely unapproachable despite the small smile that she wore. Even her hair was parted in a neat, strict line down the middle. Her chin was perhaps too wide and the tip of her nose larger than most aristocrats, but Arlene thought she was still very pretty, especially with a bit of blush.

"Must be from some accident a long time ago," another girl with a softer whisper said, "It's not too bad though." She smiled and came closer, "I'm Marlene, by the way." This one here had soft, luscious brown hair and full, baby cheeks. Her entire head was like an apple, round and slightly glowing. Arlene felt a little sorry for her—guys didn't generally like the puffy look.

"Nice to meet you," Arlene said amicably and shook her hand. She looked over to the first girl and said, "And you too. Anise, right? Your bag did your introduction for you."

Anise nodded but didn't say anything.

"I assume you girls have already tried everything with this ugly crack here," Arlene continued conversationally.

"It's just a bloody bedpost, stop making a fuss over it," the girl furthest from her, with the bed next to the window overlooking the lake's splendor, spoke up.

Arlene's eyes widened: now _she_ was a looker. Heavy-lidded and lethargic, the girl had a strong jaw that was too square for Arlene's aesthetics, but that didn't detract from her looks at all—if anything it added a certain character. Her eyes were framed by the thickest lashes that cast shadows into her eyes. Her eyebrows disappeared at its peak, not even reaching the outer corner of her eyes, but its almost whimsical sparseness softened the otherwise heavy eyes and defined jawline. There was a beauty mole underneath her left eye, the side semi-blocked by a curtain of voluminous curls.

"Chelsea, try to be friendly," Marlene chided. Turning to Arlene, she smiled apologetically for Chelsea.

"She'll learn to figure out Chelsea's cycles to avoid her grouchiest days," Anise drawled out again.

Marlene smiled apologetically again, as if it was the only thing she knew how to do.

Arlene looked around and beamed at these three girls: she just _knew_ that all of them were going to get along grandly.

.

_You have yet to learn what you will become._

* * *

It was a _little_ unfair, Remus supposed, to assign the new, unsuspecting girl to that particular infamous room, but it was the only opening, and like Lily said, who else would voluntarily take up the spot?

* * *

Note: 'i_f I cant have kindness, I'll have independence_' is the famous declaration that marks the true remaking of Eliza Dolittle, from Geroge Bernard Shaw's play, _Pygmalion_. It is more widely known as _My Fair Lady_, the movie, which is based on the play but takes large liberties with the ending and Eliza's character.


	5. The School for Scandal

**Chapter 5**

**The School for Scandal**

_- for even Scandal dies, if you approve -_

Arlene was quick to find that a life in a confined castle was no more varied than life in a confined rich neighborhood. That was even with magical corridors and sports that required flying. In fact, she half missed the baseball matches—she never genuinely cared for sports in the way that some were passionate about it, but she cared for very little when it came down to it. At baseball games, though, her Daddy's box always had a full bar and sometimes a cute bartender. The way these British people watched Quidditch, well, it reminded her of Sunday football.

So naturally she had to try out for Quidditch second week, if only to see if James _was_ the quarterback.

Come Saturday, Arlene tore open the curtains to Anise's bed grandly, and growled out to the blonde girl who was _still_ passed out at one in the afternoon, "Anise, Anise, _Anise._"

As was only natural for teenage girls who shared a dormitory room and, perhaps more importantly, closet space, alliances were quickly forged. Chelsea was one of the most ferociously gorgeous girls in the school and therefore one of the most hated by females. Arlene would have loved to gossip about other girls with Chelsea, drawn to her beauty, except that Chelsea happened to be a strict vegan. Arlene figured herself a very accommodating sort of person, but it was just downright impossible to eat breakfast with Chelsea. She would call up the house elves to inquire whether the sugar was refined without bone-char in the process, and demanded why the tea was served with honey. Arlene couldn't get in a _single_ sentence about Estelle's plaid pants peaking from under her robe or inquire if she too thought Natalia was fugitively glancing at Emil too often.

Arlene then turned to Marlene, who was so shy and unobtrusive that it was impossible to dislike her _or_ like her. The girl also had a reputation of being a secret psychopath, because nobody had ever seen her cry. Arlene thought that it was an absurd claim, even if Marlene did rarely—if ever—show any sort of emotion beyond quietly apologetic.

So naturally, Arlene and Anise became the bosom friends over the span of two weeks, their relationship further heightened by the fact that Anise Nott wasn't very popular in Gryffindor, and so had no other close friends to compete with the new transfer student. Arlene did not have the advantage of being from Britain and therefore sharing the extensive knowledge of the Families, but she had an ear for these things, and learned that Nott was a pureblood family with prestigious history and very little wealth to support that. It would have created an uproar that she was placed in Gryffindor instead of Slytherin, but Nott came after Black, and all whispery gossip was focused on _Sirius Altair Deneb Black, yes _that_ Black didn't make it to Slytherin!_ Unlike Sirius, however, Anise continued to associate with the snaky house, and had even dated one of _them_ last year.

It turned out that Gryffindor was just as judgmental about these sorts of things as Slytherin was.

It all made sense then, that the fourth bed in their room was empty—and it was not just because of the cracked bedpost. Nobody really wanted to live with these girls.

But Arlene always made the best of out every situation, and in this case her solution was to get all of them completely smashed together. Nothing was quite as effective at building camaraderie as illicit drinking of liquor; Arlene was glad that she had the foresight to smuggle a few bottles from Daddy's cellar.

The problem was, although Anise held her liquor surprisingly well the night before, the consequences of drinking took form in sleeping like a dead log. Normally Anise was an early riser, but there was nothing that suggested the girl was inclined to rise at _all_ today.

"Anise, _wake up_!" Arlene yelled out, aggravated.

A low groan emitted from Anise as she tried to bury her head in a pool of silk bedding.

"She doesn't wake up until dinner whenever she drinks," all of a sudden Chelsea piped up, her motion of brushing her luscious hair uninterrupted.

"But she said that she wanted to come with me to see the tryouts." At this point Arlene was seriously considering summoning a bucket of cold water to dump on the sleeping girl. "Speaking of which, do you want to come along?"

Chelsea made an indignant sound. "It's a brutally crude sport. I can't imagine what you see in it."

Arlene shrugged, "There are cute players?"

Chelsea flicked a strand away and started working on another section of her hair. "Lloyd doesn't play, so there is no purpose to it. Besides, nothing is worth getting dirty over."

"There's a certain charm to getting sweaty," Arlene halfheartedly argued. She should have remembered that, for Chelsea, every motion in every day—hell every brushstroke through her hair—was for Lloyd Curtiss. Arlene had not seen this elusive being yet, but she had learned that he was graduated and had intensely smoldering eyes. Arlene was savvy enough to take all this with a grain of salt, however, especially since as she was leaving the informant was still gushing on about spontaneous combustion under his gaze.

Beyond being absurdly beautiful, Chelsea's unpopularity arose from her unnecessarily competitive nature. She got jealous of every single girl who talked to Lloyd, and the man had flirted with most of the school's female population.

But her attention was pulled away as Anise finally showed the sign of life by grunting and turning over.

"If you don't get up on the count of five, I will have to take extreme measures!" Arlene threatened Anise.

Thankfully, Anise groggily sat up, and Arlene did not have to think of an extreme measure to execute. Anise yelped in surprised when Arlene threw a bundle of clothes at her, but when she realized it was the outfit she picked out the day before, it took Anise precisely ten minutes to gather herself and put on, and together they walked to the pit.

The Quidditch pit was a horridly muddy expanse of space, in Arlene's view, but she kept that to herself. The field was covered in a lush layer of grass, but most of it was upturned, showing dirt instead of the almost blackened green of the grass blades, catching the blinding afternoon sun like little blades of steel.

Arlene saw the four Gryffindor kings from afar—James and Sirius both relaxed and tossing a red ball between them, and Remus and Peter looking at them with fond boredom. And maybe a slight hint of dejection that came with the knowledge that they were utterly horrid at the sport. It was hard to decipher such complex looks from her distance.

Before she could approach them, however, a grinning boy blocked her way and shoved a broomstick into her hands. He was tall and tanned, and Arlene read his glistening badge that said 'Captain Bryant'. Ah a jock, how wonderful—Arlene knew her way around jocks!

He was so delighted at seeing two lovely ladies at tryouts that he ignored all of Anise's protests and gave her a broom as well. "Don't be shy," Captain Bryant encouraged, "Give it a try! Fly around the hoop twice and then we'll see how you fare with a Bludger. Sirius's returning as our star Beater, and no wizard or witch is better at shooting hoops than James, but we do have two openings for a Chaser and a Beater."

He looked at them with blatant hope, and Arlene felt the captain's enthusiasm infect her. She obligingly got on the broom to fly to the circle in the distance. That was easy enough, but the moment Bryant let loose a dark ball that came straight at her, Arlene let out a yelp and nearly fell off her broom.

Sirius had already sent the ball back to the Captain with a mighty swing, before Arlene even realized that he had gotten in the air. She supposed that she ought to thank him, but she was still determined to dislike the boy, so she shot him a dirty look and flew down to the ground resigned.

Anise, on the other hand, couldn't even lift the broom. With a closer look, Arlene could tell that she wasn't putting any intent behind her gestures, so no wonder the broom lied limp on the ground. It wasn't until later, when their friendship was much stronger, did Anise tell her that under no circumstance was a pureblood lady to fly on a stick. The flying wasn't bad, but it was nearly impossible to keep a graceful posture on the thing, and it was not worth the headache of trying to maintain the edge of her robe just touching her ankle at the right place. Arlene then understood why the Slytherin team was entirely male.

Captain Bryant was visibly disappointed that neither girl made it to the team, but he still thanked them for trying.

Arlene shrugged and smiled at Captain Bryant. The outcome didn't come as a shock to her: she had never been athletic in the sense of getting dirty and gritty and sweaty anyway. She was athletic in her calves and her posture; she was athletic in that she was a cheerleader. So she said, "Well there goes the hope that I have a natural knack for Quidditch. I'd still be happy to help out with the cheerleading though."

Captain Bryant blinked at her.

Arlene blinked back, waiting for his invitation to join the cheerleading team.

James jogged over and broke their blinking contest. "Cheerleading, did I hear? Isn't that a sport for the Muggle Americans?"

"Well no, it's not really recognized as a sport, but there's definitely a lot of tumbling and kicking your legs," Arlene replied.

"Sirius showed me this thing with cheerleaders," James winked lewdly, "Would love to introduce it to the rest of Hogwarts."

Arlene laughed, "It's good to see that girls in skimpy sweaters are appreciated everywhere," she said half sarcastically.

"What does a cheerleader do exactly?" Bryant asked.

"Just girls cheering on the team by doing stunts in miniskirts," Arlene explained.

"Brilliant!" Bryant applauded, "That's definitely something we should have!"

Sirius also joined the conversation, finally deciding to twirl down from midair in a show of skill and recklessness. "I wholly support this movement," he nodded with great gravity.

"It's decided then," Arlene chirped merrily, happy to have a semblance of her old life in this brave new world. "When do you have the field booked? I'll gather a few girls and practice; just a few easy elevators and knee stands, I don't think rewinds or basket tosses are reasonable by the first game."

Captain Bryant seemed assured by Arlene's confidence, but before he gave her his final approval, he glanced to James, who nodded almost imperceptibly.

_Now this was interesting_, Arlene thought, as Bryant jauntily began an explanation of the Quidditch field. It would appear that she had underestimated James and blasé-boy Sirius. They weren't just a quartet of popular kids; they were much more than that. They had power over the authoritative figure—the Captain, who was a docile lamb even without the threat of lion fangs—and that was hard to come by, especially for a bunch of teenage boys.

Bryant was still rambling on about the logistics and the order of the matches, and Arlene really couldn't bring herself to care. So she smiled with the right amount of teeth and said, "That's very helpful, just let me round up the girls first, is that okay, oh captain my captain?"

Bryant blushed, and it was endearing, because despite the puffiness of his cheeks, he was cute in a preppy, need-tutoring-at-math kind of way. Arlene waved goodbye to them—all of them, including Sirius, and Arlene felt like she was a better person for it.

Anise trotted beside her, pace perfectly matched to hers. One of Anise's special superpowers was that she always knew what tempo her companion walked on. Arlene had voiced this once, and all she got in return was a tiny smile and Anise telling her this was a skill not many pureblood ten-year-olds were without. As of now, however, Anise held the faintest hint of a frown between her eyebrows. "Arlene," Anise spoke at last, still with hesitation, "wild girl doesn't mean _slutty_ girl."

Well that was putting it bluntly, Arlene couldn't contain her giggle.

Anise continued preaching: "You'll attract attention, but it might be the wrong sort."

It was very uncharacteristic of Anise to be this didactical, so Arlene reined in her bubbling laughter at this rare serious side of her friend, and pledged: "I won't do anything gauche, I promise. Don't worry, I've been farming attention since I was a wee baby."

Anise was not fully convinced, but let it slide. Perhaps Arlene did not yet understand how fast rumors and nasty words travel in a secluded community like Hogwarts, and it would do well for her to learn it sooner rather than later. Anise was not here to play governess in any case.

As it were, the interest in this American activity was higher than either girl anticipated. Arlene described in vivid detail the physical activities required and the uniforms they had to acquire, but she really had the girls at 'hot, sweaty athletes'. Arlene wasn't sure if it was a British wizarding preoccupation with Quidditch, or a more global case of girls fawning over muscles. A brief stretching exercise later, Arlene had her team of three, and it just so happened that the other two girls were both prettier than her, Arlene pouted to herself.

Natalia Irving was a Spanish girl with a baby face that was a little vertically squished, but that combined with impossibly blue eyes just blessed her with a perpetually innocent look. Estelle Qualls was not the brightest tool in the shed, but that only enhanced her beauty whenever she looked at a person with round eyes, lost and sucking in on her cheeks a little.

Arlene did not start this to be a beauty pageant though, so it didn't matter that she lost. She would just cut out the peanut butter in her morning oatmeal. And maybe stock up her favorite sweat-proof, waterproof foundation that would still cling to her skin after a nuclear explosion.

These were small ordeals to getting her life in order here.

.

_Not all exchanges are equivalent._

* * *

One would never catch Remus saying this out loud, but Quidditch was _boring_. About time something else happened on the field for him to look at.

* * *

Note: '_for even Scandal dies, if you approve' _is the last line of the actual play of _The School for Scandal_ by Richard Brinsley Sheridan. Very funny satire on Georgian social structures.

Also, it was incredibly hard to not start spewing discounting future utility at the end there. Also also, will be a lot more Marauders next chapter! I just had to set up the premise.

Please review!


	6. The Playboy of the Western World

**Chapter 6**

**The Playboy of the Western World**

_- what would any be but odd men and they living lonesome in the world? –_

Gryffindor faced their first match at the beginning of November. Instead of the usual lineup of a Slytherin match, they battled Hufflepuff, because the Slytherin Seeker Flynn Greengrass had gotten himself into some sort of accident, and could not fly. It made no difference to Arlene though; a match was a match.

The game itself was not too exciting. It was students flying about on broomsticks chasing balls. But for Arlene it was never about just the sport anyhow. She snapped quick commands to Natalie and Estelle, and they made their debut as the official Gryffindor cheerleading team.

Gryffindor won without much difficulty, something that Sirius seemed actually disappointed about. James was ecstatic as usual just to play the game, and Captain Bryant kept giving Sirius these nervous looks, as if he expected Sirius to do something stupid to bring up the Hufflepuff score just to make things interesting. Sirius didn't, and so the match went on rather predictably, and they won their first game of the year, in the middle of waves of screaming and hooraying of the crowd behind the cheerleading team.

The afterparty to the match was the exciting part.

All of them were smelly and disgusting, but showers were quick (if scarce) resources, and they soon congregated in the common room.

Arlene came down, with wet hair sticking to her neck and in a lace black babydoll dress which she cinched at the waist with a skinny red belt that looked just whimsical enough to pass off as 'oh I just threw this on'. The music was already on, but nobody was drinking enough yet, so the mood was lacking.

That was what wise ancestors invented the game of King's Cup for.

It wasn't hard gathering enough people for a game, and Arlene quickly called the teams to form an even number of boys and girls. The dinner party might be out of style, but an even ratio of the genders was always a good idea.

Arlene lost the first round of Never Have I Ever—it was jigged, that was what it was. James had said he never make out with a celebrity or celebrity-to-be, and Sirius said he never not had a date to an event. Bryant said something about Quidditch that thankfully she passed, but then Chelsea said she never and would never own a fur coat.

So she took the bottle of firewhiskey from the center and took a swig from it. It tasted like middle-shelf Jack Daniels, and Arlene wanted to laugh. The way these kids passed this around like it was some prized possession—straight out of Tennessee, she snickered.

Without a word, she scrambled up and ran back, ignoring Sirius's cries of 'Lo, the America bird can't take whiskey!"

She came back with the bottle of Glenlivet 25 that she smuggled out their cellar back home. She conjured a few tulip glasses with a swish and poured a round for the circle of boys and girls. "Drink up you lot of scurvy drunkards," she declared, "This is the night that we live for!"

James chugged it down like it was butterbeer, and Peter did his best to mimic the fluidity of his movement. Emil sipped it, frowning slightly, and conjured a few blocks of ice to it. Marlene could not be bullied into drinking even the original firewhiskey, let alone this intimidating looking bottle from a sherry cask. Anise sipped it with as much ladylike grace as she could muster under the effect of three shots of firewhiskey and the burning sensation of this new drink. Sirius however, sniffed it suspiciously, then cocking an eyebrow, added a splash of water.

"Silky and caressing like a lover, this one," he purred out.

Arlene _knew_ that it was silky. It said so on the description. Silky and sweet until the 'burst of winter spices lit up the heavy, thick flavor'. She learned the finer tastes of whiskies the same way she learned History. Sirius, however, was the sort that seemed to know all these things _a priori_. It was enviable, and also kind of hot, and Arlene _hated_ him for it.

She disliked Sirius far more than she should have, and liked him far more than she could bear. She could not _stand_ how he made every crappy tee look like it was handcrafted by Marc Bohan; she could not stand how he leaned too far back on the hind legs of his chair and never fell; she could not stand how his calves were perfectly shaped just like Orlando's. (Although she _did_ wish that Sirius would cut his hair, it was getting ridiculously long—he wasn't some flower child from the 60s, for god's sake!)

"I hate whisky," Natalie whined and broke the intense glaring that Arlene was sure she was giving, "it's so disgusting, why would anybody drink it?"

"Oh please, everybody knows that scotch is the Rolls Royce among Cadillacs," Arlene said flippantly.

Sirius sipped the whisky with half-closed eyes, a faint smile, and cigarette smoke wreathing his head. "Never knew Muggle whisky had this much flavor, I'm tempted to say that I'm impressed."

Arlene felt a surging pride. Well she might absolutely hate Sirius, but that didn't mean she didn't want his approval, or that his admiration did not light a glow in her stomach.

He ruined this moment entirely though, by drawing a Jack and declaring emphatically, "Whenever a bird draws a card, she has to snog the last bird who drew one!"

Arlene sighed audibly this time. _Boys_.

Anise spoke up though, "I'll kiss whoever damn I want, and not because some stupid rule you made."

"Oh c'mon, what's the harm of a little kissy kiss," Sirius made a sucking face, and Arlene was torn between being amused and aghast. In the end, she decided that even if she was aghast, it would only help if she acted amused, so she threw her head back and laughed. "See," Sirius pointed to Arlene, "I'm sure she snogs you all the time up in your dorm."

"All the more reason to not show you," Arlene teased.

"_And_ it's none of your business," Anise said caustically.

Arlene was surprised—normally Anise was careful to maintain at least a front of civility even to the most detested individuals. It was very rare for her to lose her poise, and although most of it was for show around the purebloods, Arlene could safely say that she had never once seen Anise take _that_ tone.

"Oh c'mon, you _got_ to get practice somewhere, you need it!" he smirked at Anise, not paying attention to how harsh his words were.

Sirius was so _cruel_, Arlene realized.

He was cruel in a way that James wasn't. Sure, they were both bullies and awfully funny at it, but James never bullied without some sort of justification, no matter how contrived it was. Sirius was cruel just _because_, sometimes. And he got away with it because everybody loved him despite it. It made James a better person but Sirius a more interesting one.

And even Anise agreed, it would seem, because Anise threw her head back and flipped her hair, and when Sirius looked away, Anise turned her eyes towards Sirius, almost disappointed.

How could Arlene have missed it before? The sidelong glances, the overtly dramatic gestures—all beckoning that Anise was secretly enamored with Sirius. Arlene groaned, clutching her head: of course Anise was, of _course_. She should have known—who in the damned school was _not_ enamored with Sirius?

Fucking asshole.

The asshole lit up a cigarette gracefully and then after a few puffs passed it around. Of course when James was done with it, Arlene extended her arm out to get it before he bypassed her to give it to Bryant on her other side. She took a long drag out of it. Arlene didn't like cigarettes particularly. In fact, she found the tobacco a little repulsive, and her mouth always furry afterwards, not to mention her esophagus—but it was one of those social things that she did.

James seemed delighted that a girl—a _bird_, as they put it—went along with their mischief, and passed it to her again after his turn.

"You ever tried hookah?" She asked, puffing out a string of smoke into the air above them, puckering her mouth just so.

"Yeah," Sirius puffed out a laugh along with his tobacco smoke, "hated the strawberry flavoring."

Arlene chuckled despite the lack of humor—she could feel the warm, lethargic glow spreading through her limbs from the whisky now. Everything seemed happy and warm and _funny_.

"Got a water pipe in our room, wanna go for a hit?"

"Nah," Arlene rejected easily, "I've found out that whisky and smoking doesn't mix well for me."

Sirius shrugged, and they gathered Anise, Emil and some other girls to their room for a round. It was probably just a ruse to show off to the girls how they could trick the single-ed spells laid on the dormitory stairs.

Arlene looked around the room, leaning back and exhaling out the last of the tobacco in her lungs. Marlene was looking at them reproachfully from her corner, and Lily might have judged them harshly for this little episode. Remus, however, sat on the couch with a small smile. Arlene thought that she saw a cloud of sadness around him, and was overcome with a desire to make him smile. She couldn't understand why he didn't just join them, and instead just looked at them as if they were behind a glass wall that he couldn't bypass. She couldn't stand it when people looked so _sad_, so she walked over to him, stumbling only once along the way.

"Helo," she tried to say in Welsh, and failed miserably, sounding more like badly pronounced Russian than anything else. "Why didn't you come play?" She said the question without a questioning tone, and instead squeezed in between him and the end of the couch. It was completely necessary, in her hazy state of mind, for her to be as close to Remus as possible, despite the space on his other side.

"I'm not feeling too well," Remus answered, and indeed he did look even paler than usual.

Arlene immediately felt bad for him, "So why aren't you snuggled up in bed? Do you want me to get you some water?"

"No I'm fine," he said with a trademark soft smile. "I had to stay and make sure nothing got too crazy. Lily is only one girl after all, and she also likes her firewhiskey."

"Ah, how responsible!" Arlene wasn't sure if she liked Remus being so considerate towards Lily, although she was now sort of friends with the girl, and she always admired this characteristic of Remus. She couldn't figure out anything with this warm glow though, so instead she asked, "Whatcha reading there?"

"Ovid's _Metamorphoses_," he replied calmly, "I like rereading his poems."

Arlene remembered her private tutor yelling at her once because she wouldn't read _Ovid_. The tutor had said that it was a cornerstone of epic poetry, but it was such a large book! "You're so smart," Arlene cooed, "So, so smart, we didn't have anybody like you back home." She couldn't help her hand from looping around his shoulder and drawing him closer. "You remind me of Bluntschli."

"Who?"

"Bluntschli, you know, the chocolate soldier from _Arms and the Man_."

"Oh, Bernard Shaw."

Arlene did not pick up on his tone of mild surprise; if she did, she might have been offended. As it was however, she just continued cooing in a rather embarrassing manner: "You're such a chocolate-cream soldier."

In a moment of recklessness, she kissed his cheek, feeling it warm up under her lips.

"I'm gonna go up and see Sirius and James be higher than the Empire State building now, okay?" and she disappeared up the stairs.

.

_Life rewards the daring, crowning them the jewel of the world; the rest just got caught up in the undertow._

* * *

It was too bad that the full moon fell on the day before the first match—the first afterparty was always the most interesting. But then again, the moon _always_ fell on some inconvenient date, be it a Hogsmead weekend, or before a test, or even Christmas.

Remus followed James and Sirius up soon after, after finding out that even the tale of Eurydice could not hold his attention as his mind wondered what was happening up there, if it was a mass orgy that all the blokes and birds participated in. He knew that if any of the teachers knew about them smoking grass up there, they would go spare, but he didn't particularly care about being a teacher's pet at the moment.

He went up just in time to see Arlene throwing back her head to laugh at something Sirius had said. Sirius was good with girls like that.

He suddenly felt a little queasy. He blamed it on her whisky.

* * *

Note: _'what would any be but odd men and they living lonesome in the world_' is from _The Playboy of the Western World_ by John Millington Synge. The play is a comic, surreal story about a man who claims he killed his father, and everybody being enamored with his story rather than holding him to law. He is called 'the only playboy of the western world'. The line itself is a response from the main character when his love interest says that he is the oddest fellow she had ever seen.


	7. Our Town

**Chapter 7**

**Our Town**

_- do any human beings ever realize life while they live it? -_

Once upon a time, in the Kingdom of Gryffindor, there ruled four kings. Arlene was not so naive to think that her invasion of this kingdom would go smoothly, but she was not quite prepared for how badly things turned, so very quickly.

The month of November passed as swiftly as the leaves turned red and gold, and soon it was almost the festive seasons, and with it came carved geese and Sir Nicolas being sillier than usual.

There were a couple of important events in the next month: the theater club was auditioning for _The Master and Margarita_ (Arlene hoped that she could convince them to let her direct it, because really who in theater _didn't_ have a dream of directing _The Master and Margarita_?), a career fair for the socially ambitious Seventh Years (Arlene was going because she was hoping to meet some cute graduating seniors who didn't give a damn about academics anymore), the final cheerleading practice before their second match (Arlene hoped that Natalia would not question her authority this time, although it was a long shot at best), and most importantly of all, the annual Christmas-time party (it was really for the founding of the school, and had some ridiculous name, but Arlene had reliable word that it was annual and definitely happening).

Oh, and end of term exams were coming up, but who cared about that?

What Arlene needed to do first and foremost was to secure a date to the said party. She was surprised that nobody had asked her already, but she figured that the British tried to play it cool—you know, wait till the last minute and not sound like one actually _thought_ about it.

When she voiced this thought out loud in her dormitory, Chelsea scoffed, Anise shook her head, and Marlene answered that she was going with Karol Barnes.

That was troubling.

Not that Arlene _wanted_ to go with Karol—it was a bad thing to be thought to be in his league—but just the fact even _Karol_, one of the more awkward boys in their year, had gotten around to obtaining a date. And that it was Marlene, who was well-liked enough, was a sort of social outcast despite of that. Marlene McKinnon was the sort of girl who always smiled at everybody and everything, and never cried. Not that she didn't cry because she wasn't upset, but because she was born with a lack of tear glands and overtly strong laughing muscles. She was at once the easiest person to like, but also the hardest person to live with because of her lack of empathy and understanding.

It was wrong that Marlene and Karol had gotten together, and yet Arlene was still wide open for a date.

She said that—albeit more politically correct—and Marlene was confused as to why it was so important to have a date for the event. All of the girls in the room looked at Marlene with a small sigh. Arlene both felt superior to and envious of her naïveté, but neither sentiment deducted from her fondness of Marlene, who was such a sweet girl, even if she was completely useless in this situation.

So Arlene called upon her contact in Ravenclaw: Judith, a girl with the most envious figure, but who was too laissez-faire to take advantage of it, and thus knew the comings and goings of everybody because everybody falsely assumed that Judith did not gossip.

Judith laughed in her face when Arlene asked if the tables have already been set for the feast and the ensuing party. "Of course," Judith answered with a friendly if pitying tone, "the boys have been asking since, like, three weeks ago. There really isn't much surprise to the events at Hogwarts."

Arlene was genuinely surprised to hear that, perhaps because everything was so fresh to her. "Do _you_ have a date?" she asked.

"What do you think?" Judith gestured to her front. Perhaps people were wrong in thinking that Judith did not utilize her perfect figure after all. "I've been secretly seeing Flynn Greengrass for a bit, but he got into that accident. So I'm going with Emil."

"Yeah I've heard about you and Flynn, but Emil _Lowell_?" Arlene asked, aghast.

"I know, I _know_, he's _totally_ gay; but I really have a weakness for blond boys, and it's kind of sad and sweet how he's not coping with his sexuality."

"As long as you know," Arlene shrugged. Emil was cute, if you were into scrawny boys who looked like they could be blown away by a strong breeze. "Flynn is okay with that?" What she really wanted to ask was what _was_ this elusive accident, but there were more important things.

"Well, when I said 'seeing', it's more like, a congenial agreement between two people who respect each other too much to call it a 'hookup buddy' situation."

Arlene nodded. She didn't know Flynn well, but Judith definitely deserved and demanded respect.

"And you?" Judith asked, putting a finger to her chin and smiling in such a way that made Arlene think that Judith already knew the answer.

"No. Can't really see why though," Arlene answered honestly. There was something about Judith that made one confide in her, all the while _knowing_ that one's words would wind up being told to somebody else.

Judith laughed. "Oh you poor dear," she said, "don't you know that half the blokes are _deathly_ afraid of you, because you seem _so_ hot in that uniform of yours? The other half thinks you're the school bus and they are too good for you."

In truth, Arlene should have seen this coming. The fact that she _didn't_ just showed her that she had a long way to go in life. "There _must_ be some rational boy out there who is both confident and rebellious enough to handle being my date?"

Judith shrugged. "Men are dogs, you know that."

Arlene nodded sagely, "The best of them offer love, and the worst gives us rabies."

They shared a moment, before Arlene turned away and walked back to Gryffindor with a heavy heart. It was the age-old 'So Beautiful It's a Curse', except that she didn't get the supernatural beauty that came with it. Arlene felt like she got the short end of the stick. She was not as pretty as she would have liked to be; but then again, she supposed that she had yet met anybody who didn't feel that way.

But as usual, misfortune struck not alone, but in pairs.

As Arlene was walking, a group of green-and-silver robed students blocked her. Two of them, tall and burly, made a wall with their bodies, crossing their arms like bodyguards to the one boy, short for his age.

The leader of this clique—it was indisputable that he was the leader, from his stance and his position in this battle formation—was fair haired like most of the Slytherins. Arlene could tell from the roots of his hair that peeked out, that he was a natural brunette though. He must be a year or two her junior, unless he was late in growth. Arlene had a very good memory for faces, and she could say with certainty that she had never seen him before, although he shared the same hooked nose and pointed chin as Sheena from Ravenclaw.

Arlene put a hand to her hip and asked with her eyebrows: '_What_?'

The leader-boy hissed out: "Arlene Day." She could only imagine he thought he was being menacing, when really the dramatics was a little over-the-top.

"That's me," Arlene answered flippantly, "didn't know how famous I've become."

"Well I've heard that you are good for a quick _sport_," he leered, "Whatcha ya say?"

The innuendo was not lost on Arlene, and she scoffed at the boy. "I don't think so. Can't imagine why I'd want to do _anything_ with you."

"Don't be like that," he came closer, and when he tried to reach across to land a kiss, Arlene took a step back and frowned at him. "C'mon, this hallway's always deserted, let's have some fun."

"_No_," Arlene emphatically said, "Get lost."

Apparently, he had a very thick skull, or just was half deaf, because he tried the kissing business again.

When Arlene again snubbed his advances, his smirk fell to a scowl. "Playing hard to get is over," he snarled out.

"I'm not _playing_, you dumbass," she snarled back at him, "I said _get lost_."

He suddenly grabbed her and threw her against a wall, taking her chin in his hands and breathing just before her lips, "We both know that you want this."

Before Arlene could say anything, or regain her breath from being manhandled, he kissed her—if the rough way he made way into her mouth could be called 'kissing' at all.

Well here was a horny bastard who saw 'no' as 'yes', Arlene thought furiously as she pushed against him. She had seen many boys like him back home, but they had never dared to come too close to _her_—she ruled the school and they knew it.

There was an elegant way out of this, she knew it; she just had to be more creative.

So she bit down, and tasted copper as her teeth sank into his tongue. That might not have been her best idea, for he immediately drew back in pain and sent her crashing into the wall behind her. The back of her head banged against the stone with a sickening 'thump'. _Fuck_ was the most coherent thought she could bring up, as she saw bright spots wobble in front of her eyes.

It took Arlene a few seconds to realize that the loud yelling was not a hallucinatory ringing in her ears, but a voice that was quite real.

"You!" the voice yelled out, a natural authoritativeness to it, despite being a naturally tender soprano. "_What_ do you think you're doing!"

Her head felt like a truck was weighing against it, but she forced herself to shift her head and saw—despite the haziness of her vision—that a girl was approaching very quickly from round the corner.

"_No_ making out in the hallways," she hurled out her words like an angry cannon, "I don't care what you do in your spare time, but at _least_ get a sodding empty room!"

It was the girl that yelled at James on the train. She apparently had a habit of yelling; she was quite good at it, perhaps that was why. There was a type of women who yelled and was magnetic because of it. It confused Arlene to see Evans there—what was Evans doing here? Hang a second, what was _she_ doing here?

As Arlene was trying to make sense of the fog that surrounded her mind, Evans come up to the group, looking peeved and _very_ impatient, hands on her hips and all.

"Another one for the party," the boy still pinging her to the wall said, quite remarkably given that his mouth was grotesquely bloodied. Like a rather bad rendition of Dracula, actually, Arlene thought.

"There is no _party_—oh God, what happened to your mouth?" Evans cried out.

The boy attempted to smirk, but the expression apparently hurt his wounded flesh, and he quickly tamed his expression into its neutral position. "There will be soon, Evans" he promised.

Evans took a quick look at Arlene, and the boy, and then asked, as if she was surprised, "You know my name?" Her right hand was slowly making way to her robe pocket though, where the vague shape of something thin and long protruded against the soft fabric.

Arlene suddenly remembered that she too was a witch, and reached for her own wand. Before she could utter any spells however, the boy plucked her wand from her breast pocket, his hand staying over her left breast and roughly rubbing it. Arlene snarled, but the boy just calmly continued to speak: "Gryffindor prefect, of course. Quite a name for yourself. We have a pool on who can break you as well, you know. Never thought I'd land two in one day."

"_Break_ me," Evans hissed out, momentarily losing her pretense of obliviousness in her anger.

The boy jerked his head quickly to the left then to the right and back again, and before Arlene could wonder what he was doing, both burly Bodyguards were moving. Bodyguard Left had tackled Evans and wrangled the wand out of her hand, easily clasping both of her hands in one of his. Evans squirmed under him, but physically he was able to overpower her effortlessly.

Meanwhile, Bodyguard Right sprinted over and the boy let him take a hold of the kicking and biting Arlene. She had already done a number on his tongue—and also probably made a few bruises along his body, but he look a long look at her tousled hair and reddened face, and grinned. "Don't be daft, Evans," he said, still admiring the sight of Arlene before him. "You know that all of us want to pop your cherry and take that away from Potter. I would say deflower you, but that is entirely too vulgar."

Bodyguard Right was a more physically imposing figure, but he was also slower to react, so Arlene took advantage of that and figured that this was the time for _nails_. Fortunately, today was day two in her nails cycle, and all her digits were freshly sharpened. She dug into the tender flesh at the base of the Bodyguard's neck, where a thick vein was pumping blood.

Bodyguard Right let out a long howl, and instinctively drew back from her little, just enough for her to lift her leg. Arlene raised her knee with the intention of kicking him where it hurt, but he saw it coming and quickly loosened his hold only to thrust his entire weight against her.

Arlene's scream echoed through the empty halls. Oh, he was in _real_ trouble now, she thought as she fought through the blinding pain and caught her hand into Bodyguard's hair. As she raked through the brown strands to get a good grip, she could feel her middle finger's nail breaking against his scalp. It was the most satisfying ruined nail she had ever gotten in her life. Well that must _fucking_ hurt, she thought smugly and she yanked repeatedly.

Evans had also followed her suit and started the same dirty fight with Bodyguard Left, but the both of them found that nails and hair-grabbing were much more effective against other girls.

But the noise—the yells from the girls, and the unseemly howling from these Bodyguards, who really should be used to minor physical abuse like this—drew others in. Soon, the swift steps of a group sounded around the corner as well.

And who else but the Gryffindor Kings to swoop in like all heroes in stories.

Peter yelped in surprise, but Sirius and James, seeing the scene of snaky Slytherins attacking their comrade Gryffindors, felt their blood boil and quickly drew to arms. Peter quickly overcame himself and joined the battle as well. As they fought, however, Remus rushed over to help Evans and Arlene to their feet, quickly patching up any open cuts. What a perfect gentleman, Arlene thought happily as the soothing coolness of a healing spell washed over her entire body.

The fight, once the Marauders came, was quick and actually very anticlimactic, in Arlene's opinion. Apparently, the Bodyguards were so good at getting both her and Evans disarmed because frankly, they _sucked_ at magic. A couple of basic dueling spells—a levitation charm here, a Kamehameha there—and the three boys were subdued. It probably also helped that they outnumbered the Slytherins, and even Peter was surprisingly handy in a fight.

Once all the Slytherins were bound in magical ropes, the two groups faced each other.

"Potter," the leader-boy spat out.

"Rosier," James spat back at him as he offered a hand to Evans, who slapped his extended arm away like a summer fly. "Oh c'mon Lily-flower, you need me to help you stand!"

"No I _don't_, you misogynistic wanker!"

"As fiery spirited as always," James sighed dreamily.

Remus was by Arlene's side, and in a low voice asked if she was alright.

Oh she was fine, really, and Arlene was determined to not be a fragile, stupid girl, so she bravely said so.

He smiled but still looked at her worriedly.

Meanwhile, the leader-boy had trouble with being ignored, so he spat out again, "Potter."

"Rosier," James returned just as vigorously, and they glared at each other with great hatred.

"While this hostile banter is very good form, we don't have time for idle chatter," Sirius said while twirling his wand around—and thus both the Bodyguards, as they were tied up in magical string emitting from Sirius's wand. "Why don't we help you in making this an event to remember?"

"What do you have in mind," James asked with a wicked grin.

"Potter, Black!" Evans cried out indignantly as she straightened out. "We're turning them to the Professors!"

"Oh _please_," Sirius retorted, "This is Stan bloody _Rosier_ we're talking about."

"So?"

"Well," Remus, as the voice of reason, explained rather hesitatingly, "Rosier is a very hot politician right now, and with the recent marriages between them and the Malfoy, Crabbe, _and_ Burke households, well… perhaps even Dumbledore would face resistance if he were to discipline Rosier."

The tied-up Stan looked mightily proud for the marriages of his sisters and cousins.

Evans snorted, "I don't see the Headmaster caring one bit for pureblood crap."

"My blooming Lily-flower, you don't understand how the pureblood world works," James said somberly, equal parts of theatrics and real grimness.

"Still, we can't just, just—" Evans was a loss for words. "Remus, be _sensible_ and back me up here!"

Remus, suddenly reminded of his role as the fellow prefect, looked uncertain. Sirius pounced on this uncertainty like a wolf to its prey (the irony of which was not appreciated by Arlene at this point). "Remus, good sir, you have not heard nor seen anything, have you? Beyond the necessary measures to battle evils, that is."

"Let us have a bit of fun," Peter too pleaded, "it's been _so_ long since our last one!"

"Well, as long as you don't overdo it," Remus warned.

"Remus!" Evans cried out, aghast.

"Oh my Lily-flower," James cooed, "fear no more! Your prince is here!"

"And he shall deliver vengeance both swift and spectacular!" Sirius added.

"I agree with them," Arlene interjected all of a sudden, as if to remind these bantering people that she was there. "I mean, no one admires a tattletale anyhow. If the teachers can't do anything because of familial influences, then let's just leave them hanging upside down in the broom closet somewhere. They'd be too embarrassed to tell their families so we won't get in trouble," Arlene suggested.

All of them turned to look at her.

"You support us?" James asked, partly in admiration and partly in shock.

"You're not traumatized?" Evans asked, mostly just shocked.

"The Wendy-lady doth have a soul!" Sirius declared gleefully.

"Sirius," Remus reprimanded gently and firmly.

Sirius waved him off. "But I was planning a more spectacular showdown. Imagine a stage, where everybody can come and try their luck being the knight that slays down fat dragons—and who else could the fat dragons be, but our willing, inflated comrades here?"

"We should do whatever Arlene sees fit. And a play would help build solidarity among the Gryffindor House," Remus suggested to Evans, who was only slightly annoyed at Remus for his sauciness; it was hard to be annoyed at Remus.

"A most wonderful idea, Mister Black," James nodded, "and I'm sure we could keep the teachers from shutting down our interactive production for at _least_ a good five hours."

"I challenge you to eight hours, Mister Potter!"

"Challenge accepted, good sir!"

"Not if I tell!" Evans interrupted their repartee.

"Oh poo, Tiger Lily, why must you rain on our parade like this?" Sirius made a sad face.

"Don't you want justice served to these evildoers? It's the least, for all the sufferings of the good lady Arlene," James reasoned.

"Well," Evans was faltering, and shot Arlene a look. She must admit, it did sound like an enticing idea.

There could be no other answer from Arlene, who didn't care in the least what happened to these idiot boys, but _did_ care about what James and Sirius thought. "I'm all for breaking the fourth wall in theater," Arlene shrugged. "But you _will_ get detention for it."

James and Sirius shared a look and shrugged.

'When did we ever care about detention?" asked James rhetorically.

"Slughorn loves us, and always requests us for detention and treats us to tea anyway."

"That is true," Peter said gravely.

"And nobody would think I had anything to do with it," Remus added, completely severing his involvement.

"House points!" Evans argued, "I _refuse_ to lose to any other House this year!"

Another simultaneous shrug—they must practice syncing it privately. "We earn it all back by winning the Quidditch matches."

"That doesn't make it okay to _lose_ them!" Evans said in a tone that made it obvious that this was an ongoing argument, and she had repeated this point many times.

"End result, my fair Lily-flower, are what matters."

"_Don't_ call me that!"

"But you were _born_ to be called a blooming, stemmed Lily-flower!"

"My eponym is _not_ the flower, it's my grandmother!"

And the playful banter went on. Well, James saw it as playful at least. Lily Evans was just peeved that she needed _Potter and Black_ of all people to break the rules and _save_ her.

Arlene was more levelheaded and was thankful for their intervention: she didn't like the prospect of damaging her hair in the fight. She thanked Remus as such, who passed the responsibility to James and Sirius, who were the ones running towards trouble as always.

"Know why you were targeted by the Slytherins?" Remus then asked, tone carefully kept from being prying.

Arlene shrugged. "I suppose I'm an odd sort of witch. Besides, bullying doesn't need _reasons_." She _was_ an odd witch, even in Gryffindor, because she behaved more like a Muggleborn than any of the Muggleborns did—back home she had treated being a witch the same way she had treated being a cheerleader. This, while making her an endearingly odd little thing to the Fat Lady, made her a prime target for the Slytherins.

"I see," Remus accepted her answer.

"Know any good inflation spells?" Peter ended their exchange with his question.

The episode ended with Evans pulling her aside very tactfully and again asking if she was alright. Arlene did not understand why everybody was treating her like some shell-shocked victim, but she did appreciate both Lily's discretion and concern. She beamed brightly at Lily and said that she wasn't bothered at all.

.

_Remember when you were very young, and just a little bit crazy?_

_—I try to remember, at least, for all the other girls who did not have a group of unruly boys to save the day._

* * *

Arlene did not understand, Remus knew.

Lily did, but then again, Lily was more alert of danger in general, having to fend herself for being a 'Mudblood' for so long. Of course, she thought that it was run-of-the-mill bullying at first, but Remus knew that Lily had seen that it was beyond that. She's never witnessed something like that before, but she's heard about it, and have read about it, and knows from an innate instinct that it was wrong wrong _wrong_.

Remus, unfortunately, also understood what happened.

Neither one of them say it to Arlene though, because it was easier that way, for them and her.

Lily cooed about Arlene like a mother hen, because she thought that it was some sort of self-defense mechanism, and Arlene was in denial to spare herself the pain. But Remus could plainly see that Arlene just didn't get it. She might one day, when she was older, wiser, less of a whole, and think back on this—she might realize how badly it could have turned out.

Remus couldn't help but wonder, just how much of the bad in the world had she evaded in this way?—with a youthful ignorance that Remus could only barely remember having, before he became who he was. He both envied and admired her—and so did Lily, he knew.

* * *

Note: _'_ _do any human beings ever realize life while they live it?_' is from the last act of _Our Town_ by Thornton Wilder. The answer to that question, in the text, is 'saints and poets', and only sometimes. It is during this act that the protagonist Emily dies, and as a ghost she is both angry and saddened by that the living cannot see the beauty and transience of their everyday experiences.

Author's Note: So yeah, that was a rape attempt... I tried to not trivialize it, which was hard given that Arlene was so completely oblivious about it. And it's not that she's dumb, but rather nothing in her life had ever really gone wrong, so the idea of anything going wrong didn't occur to her. The same happened with Lily for a second, and neither James nor Sirius got it either-but really, it's just about children not understanding the horror of life, but all for different reasons. Arlene is a natural romantic, and her thoughts are unrealistic. James has been incredibly sheltered and pampered by his parents. Sirius isolates Hogwarts from home, and rejects anything going wrong in this bubble (which will bite him in the ass later). Lily didn't think that people she _knew_ were capable of such horrors, but caught on rather quickly. And Remus just knows because he sees rather than just watches. Hopefully you got that from the chapter and not this winded paragraph...

In any case, please review!


	8. Reasons to Be Pretty

**Chapter 8**

**Reasons to Be Pretty**

_- the future is now … tomorrow may well be too late -_

Tuesday of next week brought the last days of good weather. Winter was marking the land, and so when the sun rose out of the Eastern mountains on the morning of the last Tuesday before exams, shooting out strong golden beams, dissipating the hovering mist that had plagued the students for the week, it was only natural that Arlene thought of a picnic.

She only had History of Magic in the morning—Old Binnie never really paid attention to students—and she could skip Muggle Studies in the afternoon—what could they possibly teach her about Muggles that she didn't know already? So she cast aside her school bag and readied herself for the day at a leisurely pace.

She found a surprising partner in Anise, who got into the idea of a winter picnic very quickly, and ignored her own academic duties for the day. Anise took to the preparations with an earnestness and professionalism she did not exhibit for her studies. She visited the kitchens and made a request for very specific afternoon tea articles, including eggnog mousse with almond dacquoise, Battenburg cakes with marzipan, parsley scones with clotted cream and apricot preserves, a selection of sandwiches but she would make the cucumber sandwiches herself (the amount of butter to that was so delicate), _hmm_ perhaps a few orange and pistachio macaroons for the daintier ladies, and lastly baby crumpets to be made right before the occasion to ensure their freshness. The luncheon menu would be simpler, and just a delivery of the dining hall menu would do, Anise told the elves, but only the finger-friendly foods, and with the addition of hot mousse of sole topped with truffle sauce, a cold praline soufflé with raspberry sauce, and oh if they could make a fresh strawberry framboise that would be _most_ appreciated.

The beverages she did not trust to the house elves, for not even the Hogwarts elves could handle the fine and subtle selection—actually, _especially_ not the Hogwarts staff. Anise did not want to sound snobby, but Hogwarts really did hire some questionable figures of the elvish community. No, she would handpick a balanced variety of tea and the coffee had to be Jamaican Blue Mountain. Could Arlene find some brut champagne? A splash of champagne would keep the company more composed for the late afternoon hours.

Arlene thought that by hell, Anise sounded like she knew what she was talking about, so she went and got the champagne. It was hard finding good champagne in the castle though, mostly because Arlene had no idea where to start, but despite what Anise said, Arlene found the kitchen elves to be remarkably helpful. They secured her a dozen Spanish Cava that were not technically champagne, but only sparkling wine, but they also gifted her with a delicious bottle of Veuve Clicquot for private cabinet use.

By the time Arlene came out to the grounds, she found a most impressive sight before her.

Against the grass was a layer of soft, plump Persian rugs, on top of which a tall silver curate stood, gleaming in the sun. Arlene did not know how Anise managed it, but the grass was now green, and the entire lakeshore was lined up with hydrangeas in a vivid maroon color. The field far off, leading to the Forbidden Forest was littered with daisy flowers that should not have been in bloom at this time of the year, but they matched the whiteness of the rugs so well that it was a marvelous sight. Around the curate were porcelain plates charmed to be practically weightless, and twelve-inch napkins folded into swan figures. A basket of fresh mint and basil sprigs stood at the end, next to a tall cooler of sparkling water that hid a mini bar from the teacher's view from the castle.

Anise was adjusting the floral arrangements—lilies to go with the white theme, but also tiny clutters of white anise flowers, and an occasional bird of paradise to bring some color.

Arlene thought that if Anise ever really needed a profession, she could recommend her as an event curator. This was an extremely tasteful setup, even for Hollywood wedding standards—usually those events just served vegan 'sliders' and seared ahi tuna, which were nice, but so _unimaginative_. Sometimes an odd one would bring a freshly killed deer or something, but those people generally quickly became persona non grata very quickly.

More than one student was looking over this way in curiosity and envy, and Arlene thought that she would let Anise announce the event in the Gryffindor common room, seeing how she did all the world.

"No," but Anise declined, tucking her hair behind her hair, "Why don't you go? I'll just finish up here and make sure that the elves keep the order of rose lychee religieuses coming steadily—they apparently didn't know how to thread the caramel for a croque-en-bouche, so we'll just have to settle."

"I'm sure everybody will love the cream puffs anyway," Arlene assured her. Her hair was slightly mussed due to the wind, but she thought that everybody deserved a chance to be unladylike, so she didn't straighten it before going inside.

So she went and informed the Gryffindors that there was a picnic luncheon of which anybody was welcome to join, and please bring a friend or two from the other Houses if they were so inclined. It was a beautiful day, and they should enjoy one of their last sunny days before the Scottish snows settled in.

The message was well received, and although Colin thought that it was gauche of her to announce it like some common house maid, Colin would never appear again in this story, so his opinions were inconsequential.

Arlene came outside with Chelsea and Marlene, both of whom had known about the luncheon prior to her public announcement. Marlene was delighted to have a break from the routine that had already settled over every student, despite only two months into the school year. Chelsea was pretending to be nonchalant—as she did with everything—but even her eyes lit up when she saw the beautiful arrangement outside. Anise did not join them yet, as she went around and acted as the perfect hostess, greeting every member of the community: she was pleased with herself, it was a good start to her first official luncheon—grandmama would be proud.

Arlene though, could not care enough to make small talk, and just sat down at the spot nearest to the lake and crossed her legs.

The sky was so blue and cloudless that it looked infinitely vast. Despite being almost unbearably bright, the day offered no warmth. The sun sat like a useless watermelon on the horizon, and Arlene thought that she would have liked to try a watermelon fruit filling to her cream puff. But the students did not suffer from a lack of heat, for Anise had cast an overarching charm over the general area that trapped sunlight and blocked the wind.

"Great idea," the voice of Sirius broke through her thoughts. The Marauders had invited themselves to this group and were already sprawled out on the grass. Of course, Arlene would not have turned them away, but their easy confidence was both cute and telling. "I have to say this is quite nice," Sirius admitted, "Even if it makes me feel like I'm back with my parents."

"Thanks for holding it," Remus said quickly, stopping Arlene from inquiring about Sirius's parents—not that Arlene would have, she thought with a puff: she _knew_ which topics were off limits, thank you very much.

"Oh no problem," Arlene smiled anyway, because she could not feel anything but a lethargic happiness from being in the sun. "It was mostly Anise anyway. That girl can host a luncheon like Marie Antoinette."

"Pureblood girls are brought up like that," Sirius said dismissively.

Well, wasn't he hard to impress! Arlene wondered, for a moment, what sort of girl would hold Sirius captive? How could one person handle so much volatility and not break? How could one even surprise this boy to begin with? What would a girl do, bring him a griffin? She had yet seen Sirius be honestly shaken out of his blasé pose by _anything_. She must be a glorious soul indeed, to tame this lion—a self-made woman, no doubt, with a splendid head of blonde hair, skin of golden field, every inch of her a foil to him, with only a temper to match. No, that didn't sound right; perhaps an older woman, with a maternal streak, offering mothering and care and humanity like he had never seen before. God, he wasn't Oedipus! No, so perhaps a fierce—oh she didn't know, feminist? humanitarian? environmental activist?—belief warrior of some sort, capturing him in her passion for whatever she believed in. That was weak, even in her head. Arlene had never had so much trouble scripting somebody else's life before, and she was peeved at Sirius for his pigheadedness.

So instead she just threw him a dirty look, invited Remus and James to sit down, and watched the sky with them.

She picked this spot because looking up, she could see the trees brush the fringes of her vision, but the deep, vast sky was above her, and with the lake created a uniform blueness. She felt like she was underneath the ocean, and was looking upwards at it, like everything didn't grow up, but downwards, down towards her. If she didn't think about it, she could imagine that the air surrounding her was just the clearest waves in the world, clear as glass. The clouds were swimming in this ocean, and when the wind blew, they swerved around the area that Anise had circled off, like they were caught in the currents around a boulder.

It was a peaceful activity, but soon Arlene got restless; one could only sit still and be meditative for so long. "Coffee, anybody? Or tea, there's plenty," she asked the general vicinity.

"Could you get me some tea please," answered Marlene, "Any kind would do, thanks very much."

Chelsea, though, was more particular and asked, "What sort of coffee? Is it Anise's?"

Arlene nodded.

"Then there's no way in hell I'd pass that up. In fact get me two, with just a pinch of cream," Chelsea said.

"Coffee for us, and tea for Remus," James naturally spoke for all of them. "One with a quarter milk, one with milk and cream, and another one black." He chuckled at his own pun.

"Not your housekeeper," Arlene joked genially as she tried to remember all the orders. She was not cut out to be a waitress, and already she could hardly remember who wanted coffee and who wanted tea. "Don't yell if I get anything wrong," she warned as she got up, kicking her heels aside to enjoy the yielding plushness of the carpet. They felt wonderful against her callouses.

"I'll go help you," Remus closed his book and got up as well. "This is definitely a multiple person task."

"What a gentleman," Arlene said sincerely as she beamed upwards at him, his height towering over her without the added support of her heels.

So they made way over to the coffee machine, and as they were approaching, Lily Evans caught sight of them and walked over. "How are you feeling," Lily came up to her and asked.

"Great, how are you?" Arlene responded, happy to see Lily again.

"Oh! Oh I'm great as well, thanks." For some reason Lily seemed surprised by her answer, but went on to say, "I saw you sitting over there, and was going to go say hi, but, well, you looked so peaceful."

"You mean James was there," Arlene said for her, "And so of course you didn't want to go near here. I think getting almost beaten up together should automatically allow us to bypass the polite subtleties."

Lily gave her a broad grin, not at all sheepish of being found out, "Yes, but also you looked peaceful there, and Remus was reading a book."

"It was Leopardi," Remus told Lily, because it was clear that Arlene had no interest in the book, "And he is trying too hard to be Dante. You would have been a welcome distraction, as always."

"How sweet of you to say, Remus," Lily giggled.

It seemed that off Prefect duty, Lily and Remus were actually rather amicable friends, even if his choice of brotherhood prevented them from becoming the best of friends. It was surprising to Arlene, given how Lily seemed to harbor a rather overwhelming hatred of Sirius based on his relation to James, and even a faint judgmental animosity towards the innocuous Peter. But Arlene supposed that nobody could really find faults with Remus.

"We were just getting drinks for the group," Arlene pointed out the rather obvious to Lily, "Would you like to join us?"

"Oh no, I'm quite alright," Lily rejected, as was expected.

"In that case," Arlene made her voice sound just a little vulnerable, "Would you like to go to Hogsmeade together sometimes then? Winter's just around the corner, despite what Anise's charm would have you believe."

"_Anise_ did this, all by herself?"

"Why, yes," Arlene was surprised that Lily was surprised. Lily had been taking classes with Anise forever, hadn't she? Didn't she know that Anise was bloody _brilliant_ at magic, especially in area-effect spells? Anise had been one of the few who could control their magic so well during infantry that her grandmother had feared that she was a Squib and therefore hid her existence until the age of four, when she got so bored in her tower of isolation, that she scared their house elf half to death by speaking to a water snake in Parseltongue.

"Cor, I never knew she was so good at weather charms. It's awfully specialized, but I'm sure it'll be useful in the future."

Arlene could tell from the way Lily said that Lily was trying very hard to be encouraging and not patronizing—Arlene didn't care so much for whether Lily succeeded in being courteous, but rather, she wondered why Lily would feel the need to correct condescension in the first place.

"I'm sure if Anise put her heart into Charms, she would be much better at Flitwick's class," Remus said. He gave Arlene a quick glance, and Arlene immediately caught on.

Oh. It was just like the Quidditch tryouts again—Anise masking her natural penchant for magic to fit the more traditional conception of a pureblood lady. Of course—there was nothing quite as important as finding a suitable husband for Anise Asphodel Nott. And what was suitable for a Nott but a pureblood? Anise's grandmother, after the death of the late Mr. Nott, had nothing to fill her days but dressing up her little dolly granddaughter. She told her fairy tale stories and the importance of upholding the Nott estate, so that by the tender age of seven, Anise took upon finding a suitable husband as the ultimate goal of her life. It might be considered by some to be backwards to consider blood as the foremost criterion of suitability, but one must remember that Old Grandmother Nott was very old, and what we would call 'discrimination' nowadays, we simply called 'proper' back in her days.

Arlene respected that, and did not judge Anise, which was why they were such good friends. Careful to conserve Anise's image, Arlene then said, "I think she wheedled some Seniors into string up some spells for her."

"Ah," Lily was quite ready to accept that, a testament of how thoroughly Anise hid herself.

Well, best to leave it at that. "We should get the coffee before they start hollering in impatience," Arlene said to Remus, "But Lily," she turned to the girl, "Maybe this weekend, or the next one? I have no idea where to get a winter coat around here." She brought ten transitional coats from fall to winter—and if anybody remembered she was dying to put on that new burnt mustard colored fleece-wool blend military inspired coat—but Lily did not know that.

"Sure, er, how about this Saturday? We have a Hogsmeade trip planned on that day, I remember." Lily was eager to give out a concrete date so it didn't appear like she was blowing her off.

"Sounds perfect! I'll see you then." Step two in Make-Friends-With-Lily Plan, commenced!

Arlene was so pleased with herself that she wasn't bothered even when Chelsea complained that she had over-brewed the coffee.

In contrast to Chelsea, Sirius seemed to appreciate the coffee very much. He took one sip from it and his eyebrows lifted, "Very little acidity, smooth body, and just a hint of sugar cane, don't tell me this is Jamaica Blue Mountain!"

Anise chose this precise moment to come by and demurely explain: "One of the last estates that we own is this little plot of land just north of Port Antonio in Jamaica—my grandmother refuses to sell it. She's completely addicted to coffee, and knows immediately if served anything else since the Blue Mountain is so sweet."

"I can't believe you're serving this to the ignorant masses—this is just waste, shameful, shameful waste! Why, you should limit your supplying to the Gryffindors only."

Arlene thought that her initial impression was exactly right: Sirius was just a spoilt rich boy who was used to getting what he wanted and had more airs than the average old money. In the glorious sunlight though, she decided to forgive him.

"There are people who are like me," Marlene piped up, "Who just don't like coffee and so don't waste it." She raised her cup, "I have tea instead."

"Coffee is like beer," Arlene said before Sirius could get into a fervent monologue about the different attributes of tea and coffee. "You start drinking it out of a social obligation, and you can't understand the hype at all, until one day you realize that you've become one of those aficionados who say that French press is more buttery and Sulawesi has a unique earthy tone.

"Tea," Sirius started his monologue anyway, "Is like the gentleman who loosens his cravat to tie up the papercut on your finger, but coffee is the knight that tramples the thorn-entangled hedges, for whom even the wildest of women would befall under his determined gaze. A comparison is both out of place and failing to understand the very nature of these two archetypes of men. One could easily—"

"Save it," Remus interrupted, "for submitting to _The Daily Prophet_'s art and culture section—"

Arlene in turned interrupted Remus with her laugh. _Sorry_, she smiled at him, but she couldn't help it, really, he was _hilarious_.

_It's alright_, he forgave her with a smile as well. "For us other mortal folk, it's almost time for the first afternoon class."

"You go ahead," Sirius said as he lied back down, "_I'm_ not going to Potions."

Remus sighed, "I take it then," he cast a blanketing look over James and Peter as well, "That I am responsible for four people's attendance calls, yet _again_?"

Arlene was glad Lily didn't join them—she probably wouldn't have approved. Arlene on the other hand, thought it was so sweet how he was taking care of his own.

"You know us best, Mister Lupin," James cheekily replied. "Besides, your voice imitations of us are getting to be _so_ good."

"I don't know why I do that," Remus grimaced, "It's not like he doesn't _know_ it's me trying to sound squeaky like you, James."

"My voice hasn't been squeaky in _years_," James huffed indignantly.

"I just can't bear his slobbering face right now," Sirius casually said as he plucked a stem of anise flowers and started plucking the tiny flowers and tossing them to the wind. "Old Slugger wants to lick my Black balls. Probably _literally_. Already got invited _three times_ to his bloody party. If I go today, I'll just get another desperate pitch."

"Oh but aren't you going?" James asked in surprise.

"Of course I am!" Sirius cried out in mock outrage. "Best damn champagne you can get in Scotland. You know that one of his former students is a wine taster and sends him the best bottles every year?"

"I _do_," James groaned, "He only tells that story _every bleeding year that we go_. It almost kills the bubbles in the champagne."

Sirius shrugged, "Well he has to recycle his stories—doesn't have enough of them."

"You make me glad that I'm not invited every time you talk about it," Remus remarked.

"But _Remus_," here Sirius changed his voice to mimic the deep, booming way that Professor Slughorn talked, "It is a gathering of only the _finest_ wizards and witches, and it is the _highest_ honour to be considered one among these seeds of greatness, about to show their blooming glory to the world."

"Yeah and he is the best judge of that," Anise rebutted sarcastically.

"You know, he's done surprisingly well," James noted.

Arlene just wondered why _she_ had not been invited to this exclusive event. She did not care about mingling with the elite or bearing signs of potential greatness, but it _was_ a VIP list and she was _always_ on the VIP lists. "So how many end up going?"

"It's a fairly small crowd; I'd say usually two dozen or so make it there," James explained good-naturedly. "The picture is only with the invited, not their dates though, so it _seems_ like an even smaller group."

It _did_ seem like the selectiveness was a major selling point. "Well here's a good gold-digger," Arlene said with a thin veil over her disdain.

"Unfortunately, his affections for _your_ last names do not give _me_ leeway to be late," Remus said dryly, "So I'm heading off now."

"Wait, wait," Peter cried out, "I think Slughorn gave me a bad look last time I passed him in the hallway, I'll come with you today." Unfortunately, 'Petigrew' did not speak volumes like 'Black' or 'Potter', if indeed it said anything at all.

"Glad to have your company, Pete," Remus said as he pulled Peter up to his feet. "Is none of you going to class as well?"

"Muggle Studies," Arlene shrugged.

"Your professor doesn't keep attendance?" he checked.

"She keeps getting me confused with this other girl who has a working-class New York accent. No idea why, but the Yankee goes to class like it's a religious ritual. Half of what she says automatically get attributed to me."

Remus shrugged, "As long as you've got it covered."

Marlene and Chelsea got up in the meantime—Chelsea left without saying a word to them, and Marlene chased her after apologizing for her wordless departure.

"Somebody's not getting laid," James kicked Peter's feet from the ground and wriggled his eyebrows.

"For you to speculate and for us to know," Arlene shoved James very lightly for show. "Anise, you're not going to uh, what did you have again?"

"Care of Magical Creatures," Anise gave quietly, "So no. Carpe diem."

Remus laughed a little at whatever that had meant. Arlene was a little put off by not getting the joke.

Sirius, however, waved his hand and said, "Carpe diem is _so_ passé. Memento mori is what the cool kids say nowadays."

"Ah," James raised his glass "But vita brevis, ars longa, my fellow comrades!"

Arlene was completely lost. She couldn't even tell if they were speaking in Greek or something else, because it just sounded like gibberish to her. So she just conjured herself another cup of coffee and looked up to the sun.

Remus however, took in Arlene's bored expression and said, "You can bring out all the Latin you want, sic transit gloria mundi, dum vivimus vivamus, et cetera, but that's not going to make this day any less beautiful."

"Superbly said, Sir Lupin," Sirius faux-toasted with his coffee mug, "A much-needed lesson in how the momentary beauty transcends transience."

"What does that even _mean_?" James asked, "They didn't teach us that at Latin school!"

It turned out that James had no idea either, Arlene thought gleefully. Either Remus was deliberately choosing something he _knew_ James wouldn't get, or it was a coincidence; but in both cases, what a beautiful, considerate boy, Arlene thought, even if he was also in on this gibberish stuff. His smug smile looked to her to be utterly angelic.

"You can always trust Remus to whip out some dead phrase that even the dead families don't force down our throats," Sirius said while reaching his hand out expectantly.

Arlene obligingly passed him her cup of coffee that had cooled down to the perfect drinkable temperature, and rolled her eyes.

"It's an epicurean phrase that Emily Dickinson used in a joke," Remus said, "And Latin is so pretentious."

"Emily Dickinson made _jokes_?" Arlene asked. Finally the conversation was returning to a level of which she could participate in. She read Emily Dickinson—she once had to write a journal entry about _Hope is the thing with feathers_ for English class. She could remember making up something about the imagery of birds and breadcrumbs.

"She's only human," Remus then admitted, "Although it wasn't a very funny joke."

"Right, well it's easy to forget that about dead people."

"Ubi sunc!" cried out James.

God, this was getting _nowhere_. If they were just going to talk Latin (apparently) all day, she might as well go to Muggle Studies and doodle in the margins.

"It's really supposed to be 'ubi sunt qui ante nos fuerunt'," Remus corrected, "And we should move past such morbid thoughts."

"How do you know all this?" Arlene asked, suddenly curious of how Remus surpassed all of the purebloods on the pretentiousness scale. "I mean, I suppose that the Potters and Notts send their kids to learn about all this, but what about you?"

"I read?" Remus said wryly.

"Well," Arlene puffed out, "My environment back home was not exactly encouraging to reading. It was frowned upon to be an avid reader of long novels, and I avoided non-fiction like the plague. I did, however, once upon a time want to become an actress for Steppenwolf, so I've read a good number of plays."

"I was not trying to undermine your reading history," Remus said, amusement coloring his voice despite his best efforts.

A bell tolled, in the distance.

"Shite," Remus muttered, "Got to run, see you later," and began to run towards the castle with inhuman speed.

All of them chuckled at Remus and Peter dashing towards the Potions dungeon, the sight of others toiling somehow making their stay more enjoyable.

"I like you," Sirius said to Arlene, all of a sudden. It was clear that this 'like' was nothing of the sort that Anise wanted for herself, but it still made Anise give Arlene a funny look.

"Well I don't like you," Arlene said frankly.

"I know," Sirius grinned, "It's rather refreshing having somebody who hates me around."

"Shouldn't be," Arlene retorted, "God knows that enough people want to punch your face that they should be able to get their own House Representatives."

Sirius quirked his eyebrow, "That line would work better if you figured out the British Parliamentary system first."

"No," Arlene saved herself, "An _American_ Representative in the House; _that's_ how far-reaching this hatred movement is."

Sirius laughed at her jab. "Yeah, you see, right there. You're careful to not get boring about it. Not like all the other birds who profess to hate me. They're either trying to convince themselves or a bunch of lesbians."

"So everybody's in love with you, or else they're lesbians?" Arlene asked incredulously.

"Well, no," Sirius paused for a second, "There's Lily Evans."

"Lily-flower!" the half-asleep James yelled out, and then proceeded to roll over to the other side, emitting a light snore. What a charming sleeper, Arlene thought.

"Ah," was all she gave him.

"She's a bit odd in the head even if she wasn't James's girl," Sirius went on.

"She's alright," Arlene spoke up in her defense, "A little rule-crazy, but that happens."

"Oh Arlie," Sirius gasped in horror, "Don't tell me she got you too!"

"Whoever gave you the right to call me _that_," said Arlene saucily.

"When you stuck your nose into the sun like that, aren't you afraid that your nose will melt?"

Arlene gave an exasperated grunt. "You're barking mad, you know that?"

"Don't," Anise spoke suddenly, "You're only encouraging him."

"Oh Annie how well you know me!" Sirius then wrinkled his brows delicately, "Oh gee, I'm sorry, 'Annie' sounds so _plebian_ doesn't it? Anise it is then I suppose."

Anise, to her credit, only rolled her eyes and went back to basking in the sun.

They stayed until the disc of sun fell into the western sky, and the gentle dusk began to descend upon them. A few stars appeared, scarce and dim, but they could all see Sirius's eponymous star on the horizon.

_._

_You have no idea what you are getting into._

* * *

When Remus returned, they were still in the same position as when he had left them.

It was a scenic picture, the girls and boys stretched out on the lawn, looking into the eternity of the night sky. They might not have realized it, but Remus took this sight to heart.

* * *

Note: '_The future is now … Tomorrow may well be too late_' is from _reasons to be pretty_ by Neil LaBute. It's a fairly recent play that is very shrewd on how contemporary Americans talk, and how we are culturally conditioned to be cruel.

Also, for those of us who are _not_ well-versed in Latin like these boys:

'Carpe diem' is from Horace, meaning 'pluck the day', but more often translated as 'seize the day'. It's kind of like the ancient version of YOLO.

'Memento mori' is a sort of artistic phrase that means 'remember that you will die', so basically a morbid version of carpe diem, and a rather common theme found in art.

'Vita brevis, ars longa' is the Latin translation of a Greek aphorism (so see, Arlene was _sorta_ right in thinking they were talking in Greek!) of 'life is short, art is long'. It was originally the other way around (art is long, life short).

'Sic transit gloria mundi' is translated into 'thus pass the glory of the world', and 'dum vivimus vivamus' is translated into 'while we live, let us live'. Dickinson _did_ actually write a letter with these two phrases, but it was as a sort of offhanded thing.

'Ubi sunc' means 'where now', which is, as Remus correctly said, a shortened version of 'ubi sunt qui ante nos fuerunt', which means 'where are those who were before us', both of which a sort of nostalgic tangent to 'memento mori'.

I once found a pillow that said 'carpe that fucking diem'. I would have _totally_ bought it if it wasn't severely overpriced. And I love picnics, but they never work out as well as I hope, more ants and scratchy grass than beautiful lush greenery. Hm, we can't all be Anise, I suppose!


	9. You Never Can Tell

**Chapter 9**

**You Never Can Tell**

_– But if I had my life to live twice over, I'd do it again, I'd do it again, I assure you. You never can tell, sir: you never can tell –_

"So _everybody_ who got invited to the Slughorn thing has dates?"

"Well certainly everybody in Ravenclaw, and from what I hear all other Houses as well."

"Ugh," Arlene grunted indecorously, but it was a rough time for her. Usually high-achievers were not known for their equal social acumen, but also this wasn't just a celebration of intellectual capacity really. She bit her lip in thought, before asking Judith: "You think one of them would ditch their date and take me instead?" Before she even finished asking the question, Arlene already knew that it was a bad idea.

Judith shrugged, "You could try asking, but it would be quite a scene if he turned you down, wouldn't it."

That was very true—what she appreciated in Judith was her frankness in times like this. "Well this is a hot mess," Arlene mused.

Judith shrugged again, not a little unsympathetically, "You dug your own grave, girl."

Arlene supposed that she did. It did not sting any less because of that concession, however. "I assume you're going? Why aren't you priming your hair already?"

"I'm going with _Chester_. I can hardly muster up the motivation to do my four-hour routine for him."

It wouldn't be just for him, Arlene thought—there were more eligible boys invited, from what she heard. It was a damper on one's mood though, to be going with Chester Fawley, a rather boring chap, if one was being nice about it. "He's enough of a bumbling fool that Flynn wouldn't mind, I guess," Arlene nodded her agreement, "But what about Emil?"

"Oh Emil snogged this other boy last week, after I told him to."

"_Oh_," Arlene momentarily forgot her plight, "_Hubert_ in Hufflepuff, right?"

"You heard about that?"

"Well I made friends with Colette in Hufflepuff, so the sweet thing told me about it—not deliberately, of course." Also she herself might have encouraged Emil in his exploration of the broader world, having a right old girls' chat well into the night. But Arlene was going to let Judith think that it was all Judith's doing.

"No," Judith said ruefully, "Colette isn't one for gossip. Shame."

"Shame," Arlene agreed. Colette looked like she was born in the faerie realm, with an eerie, otherworldly beauty that most men wanted to conquer just for the novelty if nothing else, and that was an advantage that the poor girl did not realize. "Well anyway, thanks."

"Any time darling," Judith said, and the two of them bid goodbye.

As Arlene walked back to Gryffindor, she thought angrily, so _what_ she couldn't get a date, to either the annual Christmas ball thing, or this Slughorn gathering thing? She _liked_ cheerleading, and to hell what little Slytherin boys talked about in their little Slytherin dungeons. She was glad the Hat put her in Gryffindor—she would learn bravery like it was a subject on the N.E.W.T.s. She didn't deserve to be punished, so she would learn to enjoy this state, enjoy her forced singlehood. There was nothing more fearsome than a single, unattached Arlene Day.

Her newfound dignity dissipated the moment she returned to the Gryffindor tower, and saw their four Kings sitting on the couch before the fire—or specifically, she saw _James_.

_Arlene_, she congratulated herself, _you are one brilliant girl. ('Brill', use in moderation.)_

"Hey," she walked over and easily sat on the arm of the couch, next to James. "Merlin I just went down to the kitchen for a snack, and apparently the dinner is going to be _grilled chicken breasts_."

James chuckled at her overtly dramatic tone, and Peter chuckled at the mention of breasts. James then grinned at Peter and said, "Yeah, real shame that you're not into breasts."

"That's what you have those grotty magazines for," she shot back at him. (_Grotty, good job._)

"Somebody's been studying the British Encyclopedia of Slang Terms," Remus remarked.

"When in Rome," she shrugged, and then gently brought back the topic to where she wanted it, "And food and dirty bits are completely interchangeable in the James Encyclopedia, of course."

"Well food's bit boring," Sirius drawled out, "We were done with food fights in _Third_ Year."

"I'd still prefer something that's slightly more edible than the Hogwarts dubious chicken though, thank you very much," Arlene continued putting weight on _dinner_.

Not to disappoint her, James smugly said, "Doesn't involve Sirius and me—we're going to ol' Slugger's party. Bound to be good food there."

"Yes, good food for dubious company," Sirius contested, "The theme this year is Queen Elizabeth the old spinster. I expect some great visual effects, and certainly a spit roast. I'll bet you a fiver that Slugger had to come up with a woman because Lily whipped up a storm about his parties being entirely misogynistic in their past themes."

"You're taking Lily to the thing?" Arlene asked with mock surprise and curiosity, "But she told me she was going with Richard Windor." She had gone to Hogsmeade with Lily had made fast friends with the girl. Lily found her conduct cordial, her conversation curious, and her character charming— Arlene had yet to fail to woo anybody when she set her mind to it. What she was thankful for, although, was that much to her relief, Lily was a very pleasant girl after all.

James visibly straightened at the mention of Lily, then slumped back further when she said Richard. "Is that who she's going with?"

"I'm surprised you haven't scoured every last detail about him," she said amusedly.

"None of Lily's friends are on speaking terms with James," Remus explained, "And Lily has decided that talking about her love life to me is a _bad_ idea."

"Who _is_ this Richard person anyway," Sirius asked.

It did not surprise Arlene that Sirius did not know some auxiliary character in another House, but it was her job to know everything about everybody, she naturally replied: "Some Hufflepuff, also a Muggle-born. Don't worry James," she waved, "You hair has _much_ more character than his."

James just grunted and by reflex his hand went up to tame his hair.

"Who are you taking, anyway, if you couldn't get your elusive Lily-flower?" Arlene asked

"Uh," he looked at Sirius.

Sirius shrugged back at him, and all eyes were on Remus.

"Estelle," Peter piped up, "The blonde. You're taking Natalia to the ball tomorrow; Estelle is for tonight's Slugger party."

"Ah," James said, "Good thing you're on top of it, Pete, I had thought it's the other way around."

Both Arlene and Sirius snickered. She could tell Sirius wanted to crack some lewd joke about it, but she really needed this conversation to stay on track, so she cut him off and asked, "How did you even get them to go out with you together? They're like the BFFs of the century, _always_ attached at the hips during cheerleading practice."

James continued to sink further into the cushions, "They share," he gave indifferently.

Oh boys, how little they know, Arlene thought. "Well in any case, there are better moves in this game to win Lily." She chose her words carefully, even though she sounded glib—Sirius would have respect for her if she called him outright stupid, Remus would appreciate a more objective way to present her opinions, and Peter would like her to just tell him what to do; but James, James had a strong and fragile ego that must be both flustered and preserved.

"It's not a game, and what do you mean 'better moves'?" he began indignantly, but soon fell into a curious tone.

"Well," Arlene said, "Wouldn't you want a date who is both a catch and non-threatening? After all, she must be pretty, for your pride if not to induce jealousy; but also you mustn't take it so far that she would be angry and think you a playboy."

"And Estelle fails that…?"

"Well," she gave a little dramatic pause, "Lily would judge anybody who finds _Estelle_ capable of holding a conversation." Lily wouldn't, not like this, but Arlene knew that James didn't know Lily well enough to know this. She quickly tossed Remus a look, and he just grinned at her and waited for her to finish her little persuasive act. The problem with Remus, Arlene found herself thinking, was that one always felt like he knew _exactly_ what was going on in your head, and if he allowed it, it was an indulgent sort of allowance, which was both infuriating and sweet. Arlene didn't have the time to settle on an opinion about Remus though, as she pulled her thoughts back and continued, "Say, why don't you blow Estelle off and take me instead?"

"You?" James quirked his left eyebrow, and never had a boy looked more arrogantly skeptical.

"Sure, why not? I fit the bill quite nicely. I'm on friendly enough terms with her that upon seeing her, I could rush over and confess being the odd one out, and she _must_ show me around. Therefore I give you a perfectly valid reason to come join her as well. She wouldn't deny a damsel in need—she's much too noble, and with as big a hero complex as you."

James mulled over this, but Arlene could tell that he was already halfway convinced.

"Jamie boy," Sirius drawled out, "I _would_ prefer you taking Arlene; that Estelle girl has the _squeakiest _giggle."

"She does?"

"Yeah, that's her right now."

Indeed, Estelle's signature high-pitched giggle was ringing down the stairs leading up to the girls' dormitory. The timing couldn't have been better.

"Is _this_ what all the talk about chicken and breasts about?" James ignored the echoing giggles that were threatening to give him a headache.

"Chicken breasts _are_ one of my least favorite foods," Arlene was going to be just forthright enough, "But sure, did you think I'd pass up an exclusive party? Plus, it's not a bad thing to be seen with you," she grinned flatteringly.

"Alright, it sounds like a good idea," James agreed.

"I do have my condition, though," Arlene said.

"What would that be?" he thinned his eyes suspiciously, "Because I'm not giving you my firstborn with Lily."

"_Ugh_," Arlene shuddered, "Why would I even _want_ a baby? No, my condition is that you have to be a considerate and gentlemanly date. I don't ask that you refrain from flirting with Lily—that's really the whole point of this expedition—but I do ask you to put on a show for the watchful eyes."

"What watchful eyes?"

"There are _always_ eyes watching," Arlene rolled her eyes. Therein was the difference between her popularity and his—hers was contrived and worked for, and his just followed him like a shadow. He disgusted her sometimes. "I'll meet you down here fifteen minutes before the part then," she told him.

"Quick," Sirius interrupted their scheming exchange, "What rhymes with 'ground'?"

"Er, 'hound'? 'Bound'? What's this for?" Arlene asked in confusion.

"I'm asking this bird out to the ball to prove that I can write a sonnet," he responded.

"Not writing a sonnet so you can ask a girl out?"

"Course not, that's so _predictable_. I need one more," he scratched his head.

Arlene could hear Remus offering 'Crowned' as she headed upstairs. The things that went on with Sirius…

But she had a dinner party to prepare for. She could see it now, a long room, filled with men who looked identical in their dress robes, and women who blended into each other with their dolled up faced, all of them carelessly flirting with each other as people their age often did. She would breathe in the air, swirling with cologne and perfume, the scent of food and wine, and maybe just a little bit of perspiration, because Boy Two sitting at the edge of the table would find the room overly stuffy. They would take a picture, the ones invited, standing straight and prim, while the dates would watch and chat amongst themselves, comparing dinner tales and commiserating over being just arm candy. Girl Three would have too much rogue, Arlene decided. Somebody must wear a flapper dress though, with beads and fringe and maybe just enough sequins to push the edge of good taste. Boy Five would have dark hair that looked purple in the dim, yellow light, and would have a face that one didn't need to see clearly to appreciate. She would strategically stand next to him, and casually chat him up. By the time James returns to her, they would have connected over a mutual fondness of cider and jazz. She would wonder why she had never seen him before, and he would reply, with a blush spanning across his pale cheeks, that he did not find Quidditch very entertaining. James would interrupt here, with a cry of outrage, and break up their mellow flow, but she would by then have found out his name and his House, and everything else would follow.

Or something of the sort would happen.

It took Arlene precisely seven minutes to step out of the shower—it had to be a quick shower so that her skin didn't dry up. Afterwards, she wrapped her hair in a towel and laid out the dress that she wanted to wear. As she waited for her hair to dry off, she finished putting on her makeup—cat eye liner and put on lashes, soften her brows a little, and a faint peach blush that would glow beautifully under the candle lighting.

Her dress was a light chiffon dress with vague watercolor flowers, with a slip that showed just the right amount of lace where it peeked from underneath the dress. The dress showed off her collarbone, but had wide straps that hid the wideness of her shoulders; it was roomy in the front, but cut tightly at just the right place under her arms that it added no bulk; the hem grazed the part of her thighs that was slightly too revealing for an older generation, but covered just enough to leave everything to the imagination.

In short, it was perfect.

Her hair still needed at least half an hour before it could be curled, so Arlene went to find Lily. As she walked to Lily's room, she stared at her bare feet. The problem with most pretty girls, Arlene sighed, was that they got ugly feet. They couldn't help it—there would be splotches of yellow callouses where the bones protruded, thick almost impenetrable heels, and the little toe would be an unending mass of fading and faded blisters. It came with the heels, and there was nothing in the world that could make Arlene give up the exquisite pain of cramming her foot inside a pair of Louboutins.

She intruded Lily as she was changing, but Lily was used to being watched, living in a shared dormitory for so long. Arlene immediately divided Lily into the category of girls who knew they were pretty—you see, it didn't matter how pretty they _actually _were, girls comfortable in their own prettiness were okay with being seen like this. Arlene was one of those girls who didn't think they were pretty, deep down inside. But she also knew that she was good at makeup and picking out clothes, which was almost the same, most of the time. The difference was, she always wore her bra beneath her bathrobe, and locked the door when changing.

Lily, on the other hand, just smiled at her and said, "Just a moment."

Lily was just about to step into her dress, and she had a bit more cleavage than Arlene, and maybe a little more on the hips as well, but god, what a waist! Arlene knew girls back home who had taken out a rib bone to get that curve. Lily's hair was still a little wet from the shower, and without a quick drying spell, the darkened red curls framed her head in a glistening halo, and made the room smell like lavender scented shampoo.

But Arlene immediately frowned—and it was not even because scented shampoos were a terrible faux pas when one was going to wear perfume—no. Lily had zipped herself up, and Arlene saw what she was going to _wear_. And goodness lord, _what_ was that _thing_ that she was wearing? It most horrifying dress Arlene had ever laid eyes on—a paisley-floral print with absolutely no waist, that fell to the most unflattering length of mid-calf, with a band of red that splotched across her bum and around. It looked like a maternity dress made from a grandmother's brocade armchair.

Arlene kept her mouth shut. James would love the dress anyway—the poor infatuated boy thought Lily looked radiant in _everything_. And if Richard didn't love the dress on her, then all the more reason for Lily to kick Richard out of her life and swoon in James's strong, Quidditch-toned arms.

"You're going to Slughorn's dinner thing, right?" Arlene asked.

"Yeah," Lily grimaced, "He always makes such a big fuss over it."

"Well the food's going to be leagues above what they're serving in the halls tonight, which is why I'm going in the first place."

"Oh," Lily looked surprised for a split second, "Who are you going with?"

Arlene pulled a face and sat down on the covers of Lily's bed, "_James_."

"James _Potter_?" Lily asked in horror.

"Yes, so that's why I wanted to ask if you were going! So I'd have _some_body to talk to at the thing."

"Slughorn chooses his guests based on prominence," Lily said sympathetically, "And not their amicability."

"At least he struck gold with you," Arlene said honestly.

Lily laughed a little and waved her away, "Oh you. Shouldn't you be bathing in rose water and milk to get that glow in your skin then?"

"_Girl_, milk can't achieve _this_ glow," Arlene gestured to her cheeks half-jokingly, "I just have the _best_ blush."

"It works wonders," Lily complimented.

"Oh! Why don't I go get it!" Arlene said excitedly. Well, at least she could work on Lily's face if not her choice of attire.

"I don't usually do makeup," Lily said, strong but Arlene could hear the undercurrent of uncertainty there.

"Oh _psh_, I'll be right back!"

And she was right back, running with her ugly feet, carrying a small basket of cosmetics.

Lily looked very suspicious of all the powders, liquids, and brushes. "I don't know," she said.

"Oh _shh_, sweet thing," Arlene promised, "I'll take care of it."

"Oh alright," Lily gave in, "But it can't be…."

"It has to be tasteful but fun, flirty but not wild, trying but not too hard?" Arlene finished for her. "What every girl wants."

And so Lily was briefly introduced to the wonders of the human invention of beauty. Arlene thought she looked quite fetching with the hint of pink on her eyes, and a smudge of that peach blush on her cheeks—and Lily thought so too, from the way she twirled in front of the mirror, as pleased as cat with cream.

This Lily stunned James when both girls descended the stairs—well, Arlene couldn't tell if James was more stunned than usual, but she could tell that Lily was secretly a little flattered by James's expression. This was not a lost hope yet, it seemed, she thought as looped her arm through James's and walked to Slughorn's dungeons.

.

_You think, with a child's confidence and stupidity, that everything will work out._

* * *

She looked radiant when she went to that party, Remus thought, even if her dress was a little unflattering. Unlike Lily, however, Arlene had found a dress that complimented her like a smooth Casanova. Arlene looked nice, Remus thought objectively, but it wasn't as if James would see it.

He felt kind of bad for her, all dolled up for James who haven't lifted his eyes from Lily. So he gave her another appreciative look right before they all left. That really was some dress, he thought to himself.

* * *

Note: '_But if I had my life to live twice over, I'd do it again, I'd do it again, I assure you. You never can tell, sir: you never can tel._' comes from George Bernard Shaw's _You Never Can Tell_. It is a philosophical piece of advice with the titular phrase given by Walter the perfect waiter, who repeatedly saves the characters from blowing up. The play is, as usual, a comedy of manners.


	10. Angels in America

**Chapter 10**

**Angels in America**

_—sometimes self-interested is the most generous thing you can be—_

Slughorn's party itself turned out to be a _complete_ bore, and she knew everybody there already to begin with. Arlene escaped to the after-dinner refreshments table, leaving James, Lily, and Richard Windor together in an awkward trio. There was no redeeming this dull thing, where she was sure _nobody_ was enjoying themselves with the exception of Horace Slughorn himself. Even Boy Two had a look of glazed boredom—she _had_ been right about the perspiration, if not that mysterious stranger. Ugh, there was no worse host than one who did not see beyond his own satisfaction, Arlene thought as she topped her champagne flute. It was her fourth one, and she was getting too tipsy to be patient for the server to come around.

"Getting more than your share of the champagne, I see," Sirius's voice surprised her, and her hand almost spilled some of the flowing liquid.

"I'm sure the vintner would be happier with his champagne consumed by a discerning palette," Arlene replied easily.

"Discerning palette indeed," Sirius laughed loudly, drawing the attention of an adjacent group. "Seems like James failed to hold you captive for even three hours."

"It's no fault of his, I assure you, I just thought I would leave the lovebirds be," she gestured to the direction of James.

"Lovebirds and James, or lovebirds and Richard?"

"You know my stance on this," Arlene said in mock impatience, "Richard has as much thought as a walking plank of wood."

"There aren't many boys who aren't just walking wood," he winked at her, "And I don't think I'd put James above that, actually."

Arlene shrugged, and didn't take the bait.

"He does seem to be faring better than his usual self though," Sirius was not deterred by her lack of response. "Perhaps there is something to this champagne, beyond being bubblier than the average and terribly creamy, I must say it upsets the balance and hides the surprising level of alcoholic content deceivingly."

Arlene didn't believe that Sirius could taste the 'creaminess' in the champagne, but she indulged him. "Interacting in public was good for James and Lily," she gave her opinion, "They're both too self-conscious right now to botch it up—James is much more pleasant and less of a douchebag than usual, and Lily is forced to be polite to him and carry a conversation. Richard never talks for more than two sentences at a time, so he's more like a backdrop, being appropriately marginally attractive."

Sirius laughed, "You're funny."

Arlene could not help but feel pleased at this, even though she knew that he said it because of the effect it would have on her. Not that he didn't genuinely find her funny, but to people like them—him and her—no sentence was just a sentence, and compliments were never for the sake of complimenting.

"And you're cruel," Arlene said, indicating to his date, poor little Marta, standing nervously next to Slughorn as he delved into his speech about the origins of his champagne. Arlene might be more snide than necessary with Sirius around, because she knew he liked it. Masochist, she thought perhaps unkindly.

"She'll have to learn how to fend for herself anyway, I'm just pushing her a little. Her parents should thank me, really, for this educational opportunity."

She didn't want to respond to that, so instead she asked, "How did you end up here with her anyway?" Marta was a very cute girl, but she was also incredibly shy, and Arlene could not think of how they could have crossed paths.

"She asked me. Truth or dare, I think. Kids these days, no originality when drinking," Sirius gave a solemnly disappointed head shake.

"And you just agreed? When she asked?" It couldn't be that easy to get hitched with the legendary Sirius fucking Black!

Sirius gave an easy shrug, "Why not?"

Well damn! She should have just done that then, instead of gallivanting around with James—James was just as, if not more, popular than Sirius, but everybody knew that boy's heart was tied up. Sirius, however, was the epitome of the eligible bad-boy catch.

"And she's got those cheeks that I like."

So he was into apple cheeks, Arlene noted for potential future use. "I didn't think you would have the progressive spirit to embrace the unorthodox forward female."

"It hardly matters who I come with; I was going to ask Chelsea Klein before Marta came up to me."

"Chelsea?" Her roommate Chelsea? The one that everybody knew was hell-bent on getting Lloyd Curtiss, this handsome player who'd already graduated? Was this some sort of power play with Lloyd?

"She _despises_ me," he said gleefully.

"Wow, you sure have a thing for girls who hate you," Arlene said.

"Oh you have _no_ idea," James said coming up behind them, not bothering with hiding the sulkiness in his face. Arlene could see Lily giggling with Richard from over his shoulder, and she settled into the role of the comforting date.

"Stop pulling that face, I'm a highly rare fairy to capture, I'll have you know."

That got a laugh out of James, "Well I guess there are worse people to be stuck with than you and I."

"I'd say most of the population, actually," Arlene admitted, "Except for Lily for you. For me, I don't really have anybody in mind, so I actually prefer you, who's _not_ a bore."

James smirked, "So nobody in mind, _really_?"

"Is that so hard to believe?"

"Well it's just that you're always so dressed up, and a bird—girl usually dresses up for some bloke she's after."

"How backwards of you," Arlene commented, "I happen to like myself dressed prettily."

Sirius rolled his eyes, "Even the most best of us dress up with the thought of somebody in mind, even if it's the vague idea of somebody."

The admission would have been misogynistic if Sirius did not include himself in it—so in the end it was utterly romantic. Arlene fought against it though, despite the romantics of it: "Well my 'somebody' is a leading man from a play, that's all _I_ know."

"That's all?" James asked.

"That's all. Why are you so interested?" she asked suspiciously.

James laughed, _really_ laughed this time, and Arlene was happy about it, even though it was at her expense. "Nobody's been inquiring after you, my lady."

"So why the interest?" she pursued.

He shrugged, "I thought I'd try to pair you with Remus."

"Remus?" she frowned, well, she was hoping for a bigger catch, "Why him?"

"Dunno, feels like you two would be a good match."

"James the matchmaker," she smiled wryly, "That's new."

"I guess I just got tired of never getting Lily, and wanting to see _something_ come out of my efforts."

Oh the poor boy, Arlene couldn't help but feel moved at that, "Well if you prefer, I can totally ditch you for him for this Ball."

"Don't bother, he's not going," Sirius answered for James, as he was wont to do every once so often.

"He's not _going_?" The idea that somebody would willingly exile themself from the event that she had been preparing for so long was outlandish to Arlene.

"It's just a bad timing, he's not feeling well," James replied this time. Of course self-aware misery never stayed with James Potter for long,

Oh dear, Arlene thought, poor Remus now; there was nothing worse than being forced away from a party by something silly like a bad cold. She liked the occasional sickness as much as anybody—who didn't appreciate, in modest dosage, a chance to moan and writhe and drink only chicken soup? But to give up the annual Cheering Ball!

She was engaged in such sympathetic thoughts when they left, more inebriated than they had intended to be, and walking along the halls of Hogwarts with much more noise than prefects should have allowed—but even Lily was jauntily singing _Save Your Kisses for Me_ at the top of her voice.

The merry effect was marred when Natalia of all people turned out around a corner, and started… well, berating James, for a lack of better words. Arlene was so surprised that she missed most of her spew, until she steadied the walls around them and listened.

"…We were okay with you choosing between the two of us," Natalia spit out, "But _not_ treat us like some play thing." She glared at Arlene. Arlene had noticed that Natalia left the Common Room in a hurry earlier in the evening, and threw her a dirty look, but she assumed that Natalia was just expectedly angry for her friend Estelle, being ditched by James last minute and all. But she had not thought that Natalia would have the balls to confront James. This was solidarity beyond what she had expected out of the two cheerleaders. "If you prefer to go with _her_ that's fine, just don't bloody string us along, you toerag!"

Arlene saw James wince, and her heart went out to James.

"I'll see you at practice next week," Natalia sniffed and said to Arlene, and at her surprised expression, added, "What, you didn't expect me to still want to cheerlead? Don't' be absurd, I can keep my dating life out of my club activities. I just hope that you can too." With that, Natalia left with a flutter of robe and an utter victory with her.

Arlene had not, in fact, expected this professionalism from Natalia either, and she was gaining more and more respect for the girl that she had originally cast as just another pretty airhead.

James however, was thoroughly embarrassed by this outburst—despite being a careless person, he never intended to be a cruel one. Arlene couldn't help but being just a _little_ irritated that he hadn't handled it better though—how hard was it to smooth talk _Estelle_ after all?

She returned to her room feeling vaguely sorry for and vaguely angry with a number of people, which gave her a vague sense of superiority that she liked. The effect of the champagne simply amplified that. Her feet were killing her and the floor was still being oddly wobbly, so she kicked off her heels and plopped onto her bed. "I went to Slughorn's party with _James_ as my date," she whined before she even touched the bedding.

Anise was on her bed, humming to Roxy Music, and replied placidly, "You have no right to complain; James would be a perfectly good boyfriend."

"_Everybody_ knows he's hopelessly hopeless for Lily," Arlene rolled her eyes, "Besides, don't you also think he's a little, you know, immature?"

"He's from a good family, and not a snob; if he's a little immature, at least he's innocently so, and boys grow out of it soon enough. The thing is, his heart is in the right place, and he's actually a bit of a chivalrous gentleman, thanks to his upbringing. Isn't that what you tell Lily?"

"Well yeah," Arlene said, only a little guilty over her hypocrisy—although she really didn't think it as hypocrisy, "But I don't want to have to wait for him to grow out of it, you know."

"I don't know what you're looking for honestly," Anise said, "It's like you're determined to be constipated about Love with a capital _L_."

"I'm just waiting for the right person," Arlene said defensively. Anise was always blunt, but this was actually a little hurtful.

"There's never going to be a _perfect_ man for you," Anise rolled her eyes.

"Sure there will be," Arlene said naturally, "He might not be perfect, but he will be perfect for me. A leading man."

"Oh please, it's always either too tall or too short with you," Anise said snappily, perhaps a little left out of the party. "Too fair-haired and Aryan or too dark and mysterious. He reads too much or you think he's dumb. He's too sappy or not romantic enough. Too good looking to be long-term or not good looking enough. You're determined to be unhappy with whoever is in your sight. There are more important things in life."

"That's not true," Arlene argued, "There's not a single thing more important than discovering the beauty lying beside you."

"_Beauty_," Anise's tongue curled around the word as if it was offensive, "You and your _beauty_, it's like somebody repeatedly said the word when you were a baby and now it's forever stuck in your head."

"Oh come _on_," Arlene was getting irritated, and did not think clearly when she said next, "Don't you know what I mean? You obviously see it in Sirius."

"Excuse me?" Anise asked, half incredulous and half threatening.

Well there was no use taking it back—"What? Anybody with half a brain can see that you're nuts over Sirius, you just aren't saying anything about it."

"I do _not_ have feelings for Sirius Altair Black," Anise warned.

"You keep telling yourself that, girl," Arlene said, although not unkindly, perhaps more loudly than necessary, as Marlene entered the room and balked at Arlene's sharp tone.

"You know, you're one to talk about romance," Anise snarled out. Arlene had never seen Anise actually worked up before, but if she had any misconception that it was playful banter, it was clear that this was _war_. "You just want some sappy Elton John song written to you, and a Hollywood kiss in the fucking rain."

Marlene made a meek sound and darted to her bed.

"Whereas you just want a husband to snore beside you, and it doesn't matter if he's an utter _pig_." But Arlene had been fighting these kinds of war since pre-school years, and no way was she going to lose to some girl who picked up her fucking teacup with two pinched fingers.

"Yeah, and it's not Sirius Black," Anise proudly said, "And _you_'ve always just wanted somebody else's romance, somebody else's boyfriend, because your own fucking life just isn't romantic enough. And it never _will_ be enough."

"You know what?" Arlene stood up suddenly, putting a hand on her bedpost at the last second to save herself from falling, "I'm going to invite him to my place for winter break. Let's see how you like that!" It was a little immature, but she was angry, damn it.

"Do whatever you want," Anise waved a hand at her and Arlene _fumed_. "It's not like Sirius would agree _anyway_."

"Oh _watch_ me," Arlene said, before storming off.

She slammed the door to their room, but then a second later poked her head in again and asked, "Marlene, you wanna come to California for Christmas? It'll be _gloriously_ warm there!"

Marlene nodded amicably, and said, "Sure."

"Great," and with that Arlene slammed the door forcefully again and stalked off in silent anger. Stupid Anise, with her stupid self-righteousness, when _she_ really was the desperate one around here. Just because Arlene was single did not mean that she _minded _being single, and loving somebody was just _so much work_ and she just didn't feel like it. It wasn't as if Anise was even _looking_ for love, just some easy way to make her family happy, which Arlene thought was just _silly_. Of _course_ her family would love her even if she married some homeless hobo, just like Arlene's own daddy, who did not ask anything of Arlene but to be happy.

She descended the stairs with these thoughts, and found that the four Kings were still in the Common Room. She gathered herself for a moment, not wanting to appear flustered in front of the people, because that would have given them a spectacle. No, she casually strolled to them with as good a smile as she could bring up.

"Any plans for Christmas?" she asked straightforwardly.

Sirius cocked an eyebrow, "No setup? Shouldn't you talk about dinner or something?"

"Ain't nobody got time for that," she said—she thought it was very vulgar of Sirius to pick apart that thin veil of social niceties. "Do you?"

"Not quite," Sirius leaned back and winked at her, "I _was_ going to stay at the castle and terrorize the unfortunate souls wandering the halls; why? You have something better to propose?"

"Indeed I do," she grinned, "Why don't you all come to California with me? That is, if it's alright with your families," she said, careful to not ostentatiously direct it at Sirius.

"My family can't tell me what to do anymore, so sounds good to me!" Sirius said eagerly.

"You bet it sounds good," she chuckled, "Californian girls, you know, are all about Daisy Dukes and bikinis. Lily said she'd like to visit as well!" Well, she hadn't asked Lily yet, but she was sure Lily would love to come—there was this movie star who lived nearby that Lily was _madly_ in love with.

"Not sure what a Daisy Duke is," James grinned back at her, "But the bikinis sound _wonderful_. I was going to go back to Kent, but what is Christmas without my best mates?"

"I _can't_," Peter whined, "_Every_ year we go skiing, it's a family tradition, my folks would _skin_ me if I ditched them."

"I also can't," Remus said remorsefully, "I think I'll just stay at the castle."

"What's the matter?" Arlene asked, slipping onto the arm of the sofa yet again, but this time because the ground was behaving very much like a boat at sea.

"Flights are awfully expensive," Remus admitted with a trace of embarrassment.

"Oh consider it a Christmas treat then," she said airily. And at the hesitating look on Remus's face, she added, "It'll save me the trouble of thinking up a Christmas present for you. Besides, don't you want to spend it with James and Sirius?"

"Well …" it was a very good sell, Remus had to admit.

"Yeah, Mister Remus, you are _obliged _to come!" Sirius pressured as well, "Tis bad form to deny a lady's wishes!"

"We haven't spent a Christmas together since Third Year, mate," James also added solemnly.

"Well alright," Remus agreed guiltily.

Arlene _knew_ it was a good idea to get James and Sirius onboard first. Oh the cleverness of her! Life was perfect, Arlene decided as she looked onto the grinning faces of these boys. Just _perfect._

**-.-.-**

They set off from Hogwarts on a cheerful morning. Arlene thought there was a certain kind of elegance to the start of the day.

The snow, which had promised a white Christmas in Scotland, had subdued, and the eastern horizon was lit by a hoary sun, defeated by the snow. Slowly, the sun rose through the heavy clouds that lingered nearby. As they took the train back to London, a faint red veiled the mountains in the distance. The air still held the brisk coldness of a winter morning, and the foliage was coated in silver frost; early sparrows and larks stretched their throats.

It was late morning when the group got off the train and onto King's Cross. The moment their feet touched London ground, men in black suits approached them and alleviated them of their luggage, politely and unobtrusively leading them to a glossy limousine waiting outside the station.

Arlene had developed from a young age the habit to treat Rita like her own personal assistants, instead of just her daddy's; and like all good PAs, Rita understood perfectly her client's need for impressions.

The ride to the airport was a short one, and the flight was uneventful as always. Well, for Arlene at least, for it was the first time that James and Sirius had been on Muggle transportation. Sirius expressed great hopes for this vacation, and Marlene sagely said that the only way to enjoy things was not to look forward to them. But even Marlene forgot her pessimistic disposition upon entering an aircraft for the first time. In fact, none of them had been inside an airplane before, with the exception of the Muggle-born Lily. Marlene, being a half-blood, was much more used to her mum's magical lifestyle than her dad's old Muggle one, and Remus's had never had enough idle money sitting for an entirely unnecessary transportation. James and Sirius excitedly ran around, exploring every nook and cranny, until the air stewardess reprimanded them, and Sirius charmed her to get them the first-class pre-flight snacks.

Oh yes, this was Arlene's first time flying economy class—her allowance, although plentiful, was not quite enough to cover the airfare for so many, and besides, she had _always_ wanted to see what being poor was like. Instead of her romantic visions though, she found out that it only meant less space, worse food, and fewer smiles from attendants—but she had her friends for the smiles, and she herself could not help but smile endlessly at their antics.

Even Lily was amused, and the two girls drank their orange juices in unison as Marlene looked around nervously—as she always did when her feet were not firmly on the ground—and read over the safety pamphlet again.

By the third hour of the flight, James was knocked out from over exerting himself, and Sirius was waxing poetics to Marlene, who neither appreciated it nor discouraged it. Arlene and Lily poured over the newest edition of Vogue magazine, and passed the time along quite pleasantly. By the fifth hour, Sirius had gotten bored and woke up James, the both of them going on an expedition to discover interesting people throughout the aircraft. Marlene had finally gotten over her nerves, and was pleasantly watching a romantic flick. Arlene persuaded Lily and Remus to watch a badly produced cheap thriller with her, and they gasped dramatically whenever the movie called for it.

Things got a little out of hand in the sixth hour, when Sirius and James indeed found some interesting people. They had discovered the skinhead subculture. And while the boys meant innocuous fun, they unwittingly insulted the men's hairstyle of choice. Lily's prefect instincts kicked in, and went to sort out the misunderstanding immediately. Remus, of course, rose at the first sign of trouble for his friends, but Arlene enjoyed the rest of _Alice, Sweet Alice_ alone. But slasher films were not quite as enjoyable alone, without the shared experience of clinging to each other and perhaps feeling up a toned bicep, so she went to sleep.

Arlene woke up not even half an hour later, to the rhythmic lull of Remus being didactic. What was strange was that James and Sirius actually looked quite guilty, and took the gentle admonishing with surprising grace. But Remus could never stay mad at his friends, so soon it was all good and fun once again. Everybody settled for the harmless entertainment of movies, however, and Arlene showed them Woody Allen's _Annie Hall_. Sirius immediately fell in love with the neurosis of the main protagonist, but James scoffed at him and said that the conclusion he reached at the end was something that every teenager knew—that love was crazy but also essential. Arlene couldn't decide if it was incredibly mature or dismissive of James. Remus shook his head and wisely said that it was more of an interaction of craziness, but not the craziness of love, but rather the individual craziness that the protagonist and the heroine each presented, because they were both _Crazy_ with a capital 'C'. Marlene thought that it was stupid to be so caught up in love, and Arlene just wanted to sulk and contemplate the failure of her own relationships.

Marlene _really_ didn't like the film though, so Lily, being the sweet girl that she was, suggested another classic. So they watched _Taxi Driver_ until the plane dipped and their ears popped.

California was nothing like London, it was clear to everyone. Instead of a city filled with the hum of man-made machines, even so long after the Industrial Revolution, Los Angeles was lazy and everything was brightly colored. Tall, towering palm trees lined the streets. There were skateboard ads all around, and long haired males dominated over the short haired.

Another limousine awaited them, and they got into this one without so much fuss, and Sirius immediately found the champagne cabinet. Half an hour was not enough time for them to finish even one bottle though, jet lag and general tiredness draining the fun out of even bubbly drinks. In fact, they were so tired that they failed to be impressed by the Day house when they pulled up to it. Marlene was alarmed by the three salivating Retrievers running towards them, dragging their unfortunate walker behind them, and almost failed to notice the house itself.

Of course, it was a beautiful house, Victorian in inspiration, with a spire that undoubtedly was a secret forte to Arlene. It sat on yards and yards of painstakingly trimmed lawn, and maple trees surrounded it, with a few oaks lining the edge. Arlene quickly showed them the swimming pool in the back and her favorite oak tree, while the chauffeur unloaded their trunks to the third-floor guest suites.

The inside was also spectacular, with white Italian marble that swam if one gazed upon it too long, rippling like some dancing brook. The rooms were lined with white sheepskin carpet, a color that only the rich could afford, tearing it up and putting in new ones frequently. Light poured in through the floor-length French windows the moment Arlene tugged open the heavy, velvet curtains, glimmering off the oiled canvases of Impressionist landscapes.

"Not bad," James nodded his approval.

Lily gave a noise of disgust at his desensitization to luxury—old Families, _really_—and said, "This is a gorgeous house, Arlene, I can't believe you live here!"

James sent Lily an uneasy look and quickly changed his opinion, "And by not bad I mean utterly stunning. I mean look at this consistency of marble patterning!"

"It really _isn't_ bad," Sirius said with a laugh hidden inside his voice.

Annoyed, Arlene forwent the tour around the house. "If you want to get a bit of rest and maybe a shower, your rooms should be really now."

"Oh that'd be wonderful," Marlene said happily.

"But more importantly," Arlene asked with a grin, "who is up for some shopping and stargazing?"

_._

_This is your playground._

* * *

Remus had been a little apprehensive about imposing on Arlene's hospitality and wealth, but well, she _was _hospitable and wealthy, and it wasn't as if he hadn't gone on free trips before—Sirius might hate his family, but breaking into a Black summer villa was the best idea ever. He took one look at James's hopeful eyes and Sirius's eager ones, and succumbed.

To make himself feel better, he comforted poor Peter who couldn't make it by saying that he was _determined_ to not enjoy it. What was a little white lie between friends?

* * *

Note: '_sometimes self-interested is the most generous thing you can be_' is a line from _Angels in America_, a two-part play by Tony Kushner about homosexuality and AIDS, with a political aspect. Either praise it as a significant piece in culture wars, or call it formulaic because of its themes, but this play has such zesty lines.

Author's Note: Ahhh, Arlene is back at her home base! But have we learned that nothing goes like she planned yet?


	11. The Importance of Being Earnest

**Chapter 11**

**The Importance of Being Earnest**

_—in matters of grave importance, style, not sincerity, is the vital thing—_

In retrospect, going to the one shopping mall that everybody from her high school hung out in was not the wisest move. However, the reason that all of her high school wandered in its glossy halls and smoked in its parking lot was because it was the best damned mall in town, which was why Arlene immediately took Lily, James, and Remus there.

Marlene was too fatigued and unused to jet lag, and had promptly headed to her guest room, but Lily could not resist the shopping urge—also perhaps to see if she would run into Harrison Ford or Marlon Brando! Now Lily was a practical girl, but who was not a fan girl for these specimens of not only male beauty, but also hard-to-find good acting? Certainly, Arlene could find no fault in it. Sirius had no desire to _shop_ though, and in fact neither did James, but his interest was in keeping Lily away from these Harrys and Marleys that she was mentioning. Remus, in his good humor, accompanied his friend to prevent James from doing anything terribly stupid on his rampage of jealousy.

It was a good day for Lily, for despite Harrison and Marlon not showing up, she did catch a glimpse of Glenda Jackson entering a cafe, and she of course followed the actress inside. James then followed Lily inside, and by the time Arlene noticed _Orlando_ of all people, she had only Remus with her.

Orlando was walking towards her—there was no doubt about his intention. She could not tell how hostile he was though, from his stoic face, and thought that perhaps he had gotten over their bad breakup.

"Arlene," he greeted curtly.

Perhaps not then, Arlene thought irritably. "Orlando," she said in turn.

He did not say anything further, and so Arlene introduced Remus, "This here is Remus, he and a few friends are visiting from London."

"I thought you went to the backwaters of Scotland," he said haughtily.

"Scotland's a lovely place," she rebutted, "and who told you that?" She didn't need to ask—it was Patty, it was _always_ Patty. God that girl was always a mean friend, but ever since Patty developed the largest crush on Orlando, she had been utterly wicked with her tongue.

"Perchance a lady of jasmine, wandering in the rain."

Arlene blinked slowly. Orlando was just as non-sequitur as always and trying too hard to be poetic. Patty did like jasmine perfume though, Arlene knew, because she gave Patty a bottle of Chanel No. 22, and that was just a blow to the head of jasmine. "Well, this is Orlando," she said to Remus, "from my old school before I transferred."

She was not able to convey the full context of their previous relationship, and Remus smiled genially and reached out his hand. "Nice to meet you," he said.

Orlando snubbed Remus's outstretched hand by reaching up his hand to touch his hair, tossing his head back, long locks of hair rushing past his ears. "I'd love to say likewise," he said in a bored drawl, "but the poet's tongue follows his heart."

The grimness of the situation fell away as Arlene tried not to laugh—what was he even _saying_? And really, what were they doing? Creating archenemies for the sheer drama of it? Enacting a shootout scene as if they were in some western flick? Arlene looked at this boy who at one time had been as important to her as her hair, and smiled. They were past all that. Or at least she was, and didn't that make her a prettier person? "Orlando," so she started again, this time friendlier, pausing so that she had his full attention, "How have you been?"

He seemed taken aback by this show of friendliness and perhaps the implicit olive branch in her voice. "Good," he said, momentarily shaken out of his poet persona.

"I'm glad to hear," Arlene said, and surprised herself by meaning it. "I've been good as well."

"That's…good," Orlando made out, clearly confused by the turn of events. Taking a tentative look at Remus, who still kept a polite smile as if he was born with it, Orlando decided to scuttle away. "I've to, um, leave, but say, I'll see you later, yeah?"

"Of course," Arlene said. Maybe they would get a nice dinner together—or at the very least coffee. He was amusing, if kept in small doses. In one vain, glorious instant, Arlene finally believed that yes, it _was_ for the best that she broke up with Orlando when she did, so that she might enjoy his company better now.

Before she could fully indulge herself of some imaginary scenario where she and Orlando would be laughing cordially inside Chagall Cafe, the hottest little place in town right now, and perhaps the blond waiter would be a frenemy of Orlando's, and she could charm the waiter with her snarky comments about Orlando's bad lines, and the waiter, whose hair shone like gold, would give her a wink and a cappuccino on the house, and she would write out a cute little note on the receipt, but no number, not yet—

Before the scene played itself out in her mind, another girl approached them. It was Patty, the jasmine lady.

"I saw you just scared poor Orlando away," Patty smirked at Arlene.

"Good riddance, it's time that the boy grows a pair and stays away from me."

"So who's the new arm candy, Arlene?" Patty checked Remus out as if she just discovered him standing there, and couldn't help a low sound of approval. "Back one day and already on the prowl, girl, you are one fast cougar."

Arlene ignored that insult—well, okay, she couldn't just ignore it, she wasn't that good of a person. "Oh this is Remus, a friend from my new school; Remus, this is Patty—well, her name is actually Patience, but that's too much irony for anybody, so we all call her by her nickname Patty, and then Beef Patty sort of just naturally follows, you know."

Patty narrowed her eyes and said, "It's good to see you making friends at your new school, Arlene, we were all so worried about you."

Arlene turned back to Patty. Well she supposed that it couldn't be helped, then, that Remus must witness this horror. "_Ugh_, I mean, gosh, why must everybody be so obsessed with me?"

"We lost a gossip mill the day you left."

"Enough about me, just enough," Arlene waved her hands and shook her head dramatically. "You look _good_ Patty," she put unnecessary emphasis on 'good', as if in disbelief, "Don't tell me you're bulimic now?"

"Please, everybody knows ipecac burns your heart. I'm _au_ _natural_. Although," Patty gave a little pause, as she looked up and down Arlene, "I know that Kati has a steady supply, if, you know," again that meaningful pause, "you need some."

"Oh I would never," Arlene cooed, "I mean, otherwise all this _boobs_ would go away!" She casually glanced down at Patty's chest—or lack thereof, a very sore topic for the girl—and looked up again, all smiles.

"I'm sure your mom would approve though." Patty was _really_ annoyed now, because she brought up the mom insult.

"Well you can't have it all in this life, sweetheart" Arlene said with a dramatic wave, "At least I have one parent who actually pays attention to me."

"Yeah, I suppose you do have to go to your daddy for male affection in your life now, don't you? What do them call it? Oh right, the Oedipus complex."

"Reading Oedipus for class?" she asked, making a face, as if the only reason Patty would know Oedipus was from class.

"Electra," Remus spoke suddenly.

Both Arlene and Patty looked at him expectantly.

"Electra complex is the counterpart to Oedipus, you know, named after Electra, like in the tragedy by Euripides, where the princess of Argos plotted—nevermind."

"We never read Euripides in school," Arlene replied honestly.

If one thing Patty liked more than bitching in general, it was bitching about school and people at school, so for a moment she let her guard down and whined, "School is _so_ boring, it feels like going to Mormon sermons now."

"Oh, _sweetheart_, don't sound so pessimistic! I'm sure there's nothing in your life that a scalpel wouldn't take care of. And if you can't get your parents to pay for it then I'm sure your future husband will be happy to pay."

"Oh don't you 'sweetheart' me, I like, _invented_ that word. Besides, I'd say we should get together for a double date, but nobody knows if you'll have a future husband, you know."

"If I don't, then people will think I'm feminist. It's very in vogue now."

"Sweetheart, I'd love to chat about Vogue—did you see Twiggy in there? _So_ beautiful—but I've to get going. Still need to pick out a bikini for tonight."

Arlene hesitated between faking being in the know of the 'tonight' event and just asking. In the end, it was more important for her to _actually_ know everything. "What's tonight?".

"Caius is throwing a pool party. Jeez, don't you ever _talk_ to your brother?"

She didn't talk to her brother often, and Patty knew it. "It's just there is so much more to _life_ than parties; not that I expect you to know. Anyway" she turned around to Remus before Patty could reply, "we should probably go find James and Lily, no?" She then looped her arm around Remus's and dragged him away.

Out of Patty's sight, Arlene dropped Remus's arm and smiled rather sheepishly for her. "Sorry you had to see that, just typical adolescent cat fights about nothing in particular."

It sounded like a fight about a certain Orlando, Remus thought, but did not voice that opinion. Instead, he asked, somewhat concerned, "Do the other kids in your school often pick on your…well…your…"

"My mom running away and leaving me with her old lover?" Arlene helpfully finished for him. "Not really—it used to be a big thing, but I dealt with it. Patty isn't the worst of it even, not by a long shot."

The way Arlene said she dealt with it made Remus shudder a little for some reason, and Arlene thought it was _adorable_ how concern he really was. "How exactly did you deal with bullying?"

"By being mean right back at them. I discovered that I had a flair for being mean."

"To be fair, that Patty was some kind of awful."

"Well she didn't mean it," Arlene frowned before correcting, "Or at least she doesn't mean it more than I do. She used to be fat when she was like, six, so she's really into asserting herself. She'll learn at some point that there's more to being skinny than just _being_ skinny. It's how you walk and talk and insult other girls and dangle that cigarette half an inch from your lips and how to suck on that olive when you order a martini."

Remus raised his eyebrow.

Arlene had the decency to clear her throat. "Well, my point is, can't let a few rough words shackle me. Otherwise I wouldn't be able to walk."

Remus chuckled. "I do envy you—even Sirius" he whispered, "gets picked on when he goes back to the House of Black, don't let him hear that, for getting into Gryffindor."

There was a brief pause, in which Remus was horrified at how lightly he made Sirius's trials sound, and Arlene was horrified at how terrible others' lives were.

"Oh Remus, this is just stupid high school drama, it's not—it's only as serious as you make it to be. Besides," she admitted, "I was kind of upset the first time somebody called me a motherless little whelp. I ran to daddy crying, but in my defense I was only five, and couldn't even understand what allegations the other kids were making. I only cried because I figured they said something mean, and I didn't like other people not liking me."

"Five—bleeding _Merlin_, who would say such things to such a child of five?"

"Other children of five, of course."

Remus looked appropriately aghast.

"You'd be surprised at how quickly children around these parts pick up the faults of their parents. In any case, daddy taught me a secret, and I never went down without a fight again."

"Oh?" He was intrigued, "What invaluable lesson was that?"

"He just told me that our lawyer was very, very good, and I could make anybody pay with sexual harassment allegations."

Remus was even more aghast. "To the five year old you?"

Arlene shrugged. "Like I said, picking up faults of the parents. Daddy isn't exactly the most upright citizen—you generally don't become rich by being a Good Samaritan."

"At least you've turned out alright," Remus said, "Despite the dilapidating moral structure of the rich, as I've always suspected."

It was a bit sarcastic, but Arlene could tell that Remus was trying to compliment her. She found it sweet, and so she told him so: "You're adorable when you're trying to say something nice."

And he blushed, just like she expected. "Being parentless is the height of self-creation, and it is rather remarkable. Merlin knows without my mum I'd probably have gotten a tattoo or something."

"Tattoos are so _cool_," she cooed, "it's just like smoking. If you're good looking, then it makes you even more attractive, and vice versa."

Remus looked appropriately amused but did not comment.

"But now I _have_ to get a better swimsuit. C'mon," she dragged him forward, "let's _actually_ do some shopping."

**-.-.-**

It took her forty minutes to find her perfect swimsuit, but find it she did. Well, her and Remus, for he turned out to be a wonderful shopping companion, but Arlene had always suspected that Remus would be a wonderful companion for almost any activity.

Arlene looked at herself in her full-length mirror as she slipped into a mint halter-neck bikini with a nautical theme. When the fabric was exactly where it should be, she adjusted her breasts inside the slightly-too-small cups of her top, then slathered some shimmer lotion of her calves and arms, and her battle attire was set. The top was minimally ruched and had slight paddings for the cups, the low rise brief bottoms had a cute bow on one side, and the mint color really set off her skin and made her appear more tanned.

She could not wait to get inside the pool now.

As her guests, Remus and the rest of them were all invited to the pool party as well, but Marlene was still passed out, and Arlene could tell that the girl was not going to wake up in time for the party. Lily was a good sport as always, and took one of Arlene's old swimsuits. Sirius, James, and Remus would have just put on some shorts, but Arlene clucked her tongue and dug through Caius's closet to find something for each of them. It wouldn't do for her guests to show up in bad decorum. Besides, Caius had more clothes than any male should ever need, and he only wore that disgusting combination of too-tight shirt and too-tight jeans anyway, and nobody who wasn't Italian could pull off _that_ look.

She soon found herself in the backyard, standing by the bar, and fixing all of them a drink. She gave James a classy vesper martini, put more gin in that Salty Dog than she should have for Sirius, poured Lily a Shirley Temple with a dash of vodka so she could call it alcoholic, and decided on a gin and tonic for Remus because everybody liked gin and tonics. For herself, she made an Orgasm, because why the hell not? It made her giggle, and it tasted _great_.

Which why she was leaning back against the counter, giggling, and pointing out, as people started to show up slowly, the interesting ones.

"So that's Leigh Chasin, she wants to be an actress and has an actress's temperament, but is no artist, let me tell you. That's Karmen Morgan, her daddy tried to clean up her meth problem last summer by sending her away to the family bank; needless to say, it didn't work; just look at her _teeth_! And Remus, you've met Patty Bruce. Oh, and there's Louise Rothschild, god you think being a Rothschild would mean looking at the mirror before you leave the house, what _are _those _shoes_?"

"Wait, wait," Remus stopped her, "Is that Louise Rothschild like _the_ Rothschild?" They _were_ atrocious shoes, and it wasn't even a fashion faux-pas—there were what appeared to be live mice trapped to the front of them. But there were more important things at hand.

"Of course," Arlene replied, completely unfazed and in fact a little confused as to why Remus was making a fuss. "What other Rothschild is there?"

"An _actual_ Rothschild," Lily echoed in wonder—to the Muggle mindset, seeing a Rothschild was like seeing royalty.

Arlene seemed very amused by her reaction, so she said, "Hold on, you know that Leigh Chasin is Chasin-Rockefeller, right? And Karmen Morgan's the same Morgan as John Pierpont 'J. P.' Morgan. Oh, and there's Marine Lunger du Pont—her mom pays more attention to racehorses than her, so she's one hell-raiser alright. Patty is some sort of relative to the Mellons, but let me tell you, the Mellons and Du Ponts are great and all in name, but everybody knows that the only real fortune lies with the Rockefellers."

"No Kennedys lurking amongst us, is there?" Remus asked wryly.

"Unfortunately no," Arlene said ruefully, "Although I suppose that's better for my luck."

"How do you know all these people?" James asked.

Arlene looked genuinely surprised now, "Oh, Daddy's family came from the Astors, didn't you know?"

"No, we don't make a habit of background checking all our friends," Remus replied dryly.

"Ah," Arlene looked sheepish for once, "Well that's sort of a given here. You have to at least be somebody to a somebody to be in any circle. All the real heiresses are either complete airheads or else just pretend to be a free-spirited feminist and don't mention the private islands that they get for their birthday."

"Islands?" Sirius sounded interested.

"Yeah. The Forbes have this gorgeous island in Cape Cod. Du Ponts have Cherry Island in Maryland. Rothschild owns an island in the Bahamas, lucky bastards. Rockefeller has Sandy Cay. Hollywood nouveau riche also buy islands like crazy, but Daddy doesn't like me hanging out with the trite crowd. It's a shame—Harrison Ford used to lounge around the plaza next to my school, before he made it big. He was kind of down to earth actually. And oh, when I was nine I met this skinny but _fiercely_ handsome WASP— Christopher Reeve, you haven't heard of him yet, but mark my words, you will. He had just begun a high-stress romance with some Carnegie Mellon girl, and he used to tell me all about her. It was _so_ romantic. Needless to say, Daddy didn't like a handsome actor-wannabe spending time alone with me, so we stopped talking once he got to New York."

"The Astors must own one somewhere as well—they're the ones known for real estate," Remus concluded.

"Well, the Astors own New York, basically, but I don't like the East Coast, everybody is so rushed and glitzy; it's so unbecoming. So no, we don't have a summer island that we go to."

From a distance, a female voice floated to them, "Arlene, I'm simply _dying_ here."

Arlene looked in that direction and smiled, "And that's Kathleen Clay Ford, but she only goes by Kati Clay; if you call her anything but that, she'll slap you so hard you'll see stars for the rest of the week."

"Holy mother of Merlin's tilted _tits_," Sirius whistled, "that is _some_ piece of arse."

Lily rolled her eyes, but even Remus agreed, in less offensive language.

"While normally I would agree with your aesthetic," James said somberly, "I must say that Lily is by far the better catch."

"Some catch, am I?" Lily asked, although it was clear that it was in the spirit of being contrary, and not because she was actually so tritely offended, when James had honestly meant no offense.

"No, no" James tried to say, not picking up on Lily's playful mood—he was perhaps too conditioned for an angry Lily. "I'm _not_ trying to objectify you, in _any_ way, oh my beautiful flower of the Lily, shining so…"

And here came the ode to the flower, Arlene thought as she escaped to behind the bar again, fixing both herself and Kati a new drink.

Kati was talking about some new wave of feminism—of course—and Arlene nodded through it.

"…Did you hear about that Displaced Homemakers Center that they opened up in Oakland? I mean, Oakland is a bit of a dead place, but I guess they can't score for Alameda immediately. Still, it's the first of its kind, and they really need to step things up here in Cali; I mean, even Nebraska enacted the first marital rape law, and all I can say is _Nebraska_…"

Arlene needed something stronger for this night.

"Sorry to interrupt you ladies," Sirius grinned cheekily without a shred of remorse as he jumped over the bar top in a flash of unnecessary but graceful athleticism.

He was in a crisp cream linen shirt with sleeves rolled up to his elbows, and his khaki slacks were very slim-fitting around the thighs, elongating his legs. He was extremely easy on the eyes, so Arlene forgave his intrusion very readily. "Couldn't wait for another drink?" Arlene asked.

"No, I was just hearing Kati—may I call you Kati?—talk about the utterly fascinating movement in Nebraska. I agree, it's a very backwater-y place, but you know Brittan also only _just_ started to get on this bandwagon…"

And so Sirius joined the banal chatter. Arlene was sure that Sirius didn't even know the first thing about feminism, and had no idea where Nebraska was, but he had a charming way of glossing over the details so that one always felt like he knew exactly what you were thinking of. Besides, it hardly mattered, because Kati was eyeing Sirius's biceps as he leaned against the back shelf.

Sirius was the most sexual being that Arlene had ever met—every glance was a smoldering bedroom look without him even meaning it. His skin was free from any blemish that might plague adolescence, and always held a subtle afterglow in its pallor. Every curl of a smile had a hidden kiss at the corner, waiting to be whispered. In fact, Sirius was so sexualized that he was _de_sexualized to Arlene. It was like seeing every tendril of every muscle on a naked David, and only marveling at Michelangelo's precision of human anatomy.

Sex was something that was a race in her social circle here. Kisses were frantically given before starting middle school, otherwise one was deemed uncool, and one's body was yielded by the time high school was about to begin. Arlene never participated in the frenzy though—her kisses were sought after, and she could choose whom to bestow them to, unlike those unfortunate, pimpled few who tried to be popular so very, painfully hard. She was used to such displays, and frankly they bored her.

So she looped her way out of the bar, and said to Lily by the pool, "There goes our resident Casanova."

"You mean a raging bag of pent up hormones," Lily snorted.

"Certainly a valid interpretation of the figure Casanova," Arlene agreed, "And an apt description of Sirius over there."

"Nah," James defended his friend, "Sirius just likes to flirt. He's actually slept with less birds that you'd think, with all that bravado he puts on. It's not like he's out to conquest or anything like that."

"He's not?" Lily asked in surprise.

"No," James laughed incredulously, "Are you kidding me? He once complained about how that concept is like collecting shrunken elf heads—a practice that his mum is very fond of, you know."

Arlene shuddered. "So all the flirting doesn't actually _lead_ to anything? Is he secretly gay?"

It was James's turn to shudder. "Oh Merlin, don't say that, can you imagine just how traumatized little Pete would be?"

"He would?" Arlene asked, crinkling her nose. How very backwards of Peter then—they weren't in the 1950s anymore, jeez, and this was the summer of love.

"Pete has exhibited," Remus deadpanned, "a small tendency towards homophobia, perhaps, in his youth, when he also exhibited a large tendency towards gynophobia."

"So you're saying you'd be okay if your best mate turned out to be gay?" Lily asked.

James shrugged, "Whatever, he's my best mate and so he's my best mate."

Lily gave a thoughtful hum.

"I don't think that's a concern right now," Arlene commented as Kati ran a hand over the aforementioned biceps lightly, and Sirius grinned. "The concern should be that Remus, your room is next to Sirius's, and Kati is a _screamer_."

Remus chuckled, "I've become rather apt at silencing charms."

A barking laugh came from the bar, and all of them looked on for a second as Sirius laughed at his own joke—as did most of the room, actually. When Sirius laughed like that, with the lines around his mouth taut, it was plain to see that a face so carefully constructed and translucent skin glowing with only slightly malicious glee—that a face like that was not bred for laughing.

Arlene turned around just in time to see Remus still looking at Sirius, fondness in his smile.

Remus had a larger, rounder nose and pinker lips. It was weird for Arlene to think of boys lips as _pink_, but one could dump all the feminine adjectives on Remus, and despite his wiry build, there was something unmistakably steely about him. There it was: that glint of unbendable metal, in his blue eyes that sloped downwards and framed by thick brown lashes, in the stretch of his mouth when he smiled politely and not from the bottom of his heart.

He was really too old for a sixteen year old boy.

She excused herself and quickly scurried to the bar.

She could not stop thinking though, her thoughts buzzing through her head, the way they usually did when she drank. Remus: it was such a nice name. She repeated it a few times in her head: Remus, Remus, Remussss—very curled at the beginning but the end could be drawled out in a soft, adoring way.

Remusss, she tried out, walking back towards him with a gin and tonic for him as well. He looked so adorable, standing there with an empty glass in his hand, his mouth forming soft pearls of words as he talked to Lily and James, a hand coming up to tug a strand of hair behind his ears, shifting his weight to his right foot, and goodness, he was _tall_ wasn't he?

She wondered, had Remus always been this damned _hot_? She had always found his looks to be visually pleasing, but how had she been so blind to _just_ how cleanly the lines of his face turned? One could identity all the anatomical bones of the human skull just from touching him, she imagined. And the slight curl that his hair held, always an extra kink that made his hair look tousled and in need of running her hand through it. His eyes turned downwards in the slightest angle at the outer corners, and gave him such a profundity to his neutral expression.

She was very pretty right now, she knew: her bikini top had just the right amount of lift, and the high-rise bottom did wonders for the lines of her legs, and she was even sucking in her stomach a little, just to give a little more definition to her abs. She couldn't understand why Remus wouldn't even look at her.

Oh, good, he turned to face her. God, even the way he turned his head was adorable!

"Welcome back," he greeted with a smile, and Arlene melted.

.

_Everybody's got to love something, sweetheart._

* * *

Kati was—she was just—_cor_, Remus thought, with a swan neck, lightning eyes, and Roman cheekbones. Her face held perfect proportions, as did her body, with a slim curve to her waist, soft breasts that quivered when she giggled, and legs that went on for miles and miles. He could hear Sirius barking out another laugh in the background though. He turned his head and saw Arlene striding back with yet another drink. He accepted his own gin and tonic gratefully, and looked at the flush-cheeked girl with hazy eyes and auburn hair that was getting too wild for her usual looks, and wondered if all drunken girls were so pretty. Perhaps he should get out more, go to these illicit parties that James and Sirius threw.

The prettiest bird in the room was still with Sirius, but Arlene was looking at him straight, standing right in front of _him_, and shouldn't they make a toast to that?

* * *

Note: 'in matters of grave importance, style, not sincerity, is the vital thing' is from the Oscar Wilde play, a comedy of manners and trivialities. It's really not my favorite of Oscar Wilde's works, but it holds its place firmly, and it is indeed witty for such a traditionally tightly constructed play.

Anybody who has read_ However We Know the Landscape of Love_ would know, I like misery to hit with a bang.


	12. The Dark at the Top of the Stairs

Author's Note: A reviewer berated Sirius last chapter for the whole Kati thing, so I thought I should clear up how the two stories are related. They _are_ in the same story universe, and Larka will appear later. At this point, in _However We Know the Landscape of Love_, Sirius is still sort of with Novia—as in, _she_ thinks they're together, and _he_ thinks that they went on a date and there is absolutely no commitment in his books. He's started to feel a small, nagging affection for Larka, but nothing more than a gentle good-will towards the girl. Still, nothing happened with Kati—it was a bit of innocuous flirting. Sirius at this age still likes to assert himself that way (he's only a teenage boy, let's be realistic).

Right, so don't judge Sirius _too_ harshly. Well, at least for that. You can judge him however you want in this chapter.

* * *

**Chapter 12**

**The Dark at the Top of the Stairs**

_–__ it makes you feel kind of left out to be poor these days __–_

By the time morning rolled around, the soft dawn creeping up the horizon behind the trees, each and every one of them was ready to collapse. The party had finally dwindled down to just two or three couples necking each other with perhaps too much display of affections. Caius was still nowhere to be found, so Arlene, as the impromptu hostess, declared the party to be dead until the evening again, and shooed the inappropriate couples away.

True to James's prophecy, Kati left alone, with a disappointed frown, as Sirius cheerfully waved goodbye at her. Arlene was willing to bet half her inheritance that Kati was boggled as to what a rejection was. Sirius either did not understand or did not care about Kati's confusion, and instead had a friendly arm slung across Remus's shoulder.

Arlene was a little embarrassed to face Remus, for she was sure he had noticed her staring straight at him for _ages_. But her newfound attraction and consequences thereof had to wait—now they had to rest, for although tomorrow promised to be a drizzly day, they had countless parties to attend to, and even more to turn down.

They were woken early in the morning though, at that hour when one would only be woken up for bad news.

Indeed it was bad news, the sort of bad that could scarcely be righted ever again. Sirens ricocheted through the air, and flashing lights broke in through the curtains. An ambulance pulled up to the side of the road, and those who did not recognize its harsh lights knew the gravity from the density in the air. Arlene could feel her heart halt, then beat with unhealthy fervor as she recognized the hurrying figure of Daddy's physician, and for once in her life forgot about her hair.

Oh goodness, look, Daddy was in his gigantic mahogany bed, almost completely buried in linen sheets and down comforters. There were cushions all around, thick as walls, covering all possible space—Arlene had insisted on it, having gone through a clumsy stage in her early teens, and Daddy of course indulged her, as always. Instead of looking soothing though, the same cushions seemed to eat up all sound, until Daddy's shallow breathing glided inside and disappeared.

She whimpered, rushing over to Daddy's side, where a stoic Caius stood, bare-chested and grimacing. She seized his hand, with a woman's unnerving intuition that if she did not, she would never have the chance to again.

"My daughter," he said, voice weak and "You are and always will be my daughter."

"I _know_ that,"

"You will be fine, won't you?"

"Of course I will be, as long as you're here with me, Daddy."

"You will be fine, I have no doubt, never did. Forgive an old man, won't you?"

"There's nothing to forgive, _nothing_,"

"You're such a beautiful girl, Arlie, you will marry rich. Caius always worries me…"

"No, I don't forgive you if you give up, Daddy, _Daddy_, look at me, _wake up_!"

It was no use. He was obviously dying. It seemed like it would only take but a cold draft to take his flimsy life away. It was agonizing to watch, life slipping away breath by breath, cough by cough. Such a sight—death by natural cause, where one lays writhing and suffering, was no something Arlene was familiar with. It filled Arlene with horror, looking at her Daddy, his falling hair, his bloodless skin, his hacking coughs, his hollow cheeks and fervent eyes. One moment Daddy was breathing—laborious, but undeniable in proof of his being—and the next all breath stopped, and he closed his eyes. "How," she cried to nobody in particular, "how is this happening?"

"Shut up," Caius snapped at her, frowning at her wailing, "It's been happening for so long, and you start bitching _now_?"

"_What_? What do you mean it's been happening for so long?" she developed a dangerous glint in her eyes.

"You stupid little girl, why do you think he sent you away?"

"Daddy said, he said something about—" she honestly couldn't remembered what Daddy had said, being too caught up in the breakup with Orlando and thinking of Scotland moors—"about business."

"And you _believed_ that?" Caius said indignantly, "You complete _ditz_, you obviously aren't our blood!"

"At least he _loves_ me," she spat out, her heart strung tight over his accusation, but only because she knew it all to be true.

"_Children_," the lawyer, a presence hitherto seemingly unimportant, suddenly spoke up, "Please do not fight over his deathbed."

The mention of 'death' united the brother and sister, and they both glared at the lawyer, as if somehow his saying it out loud was the cause of this tragedy. Arlene wiped away her tears furiously, and silently dared the lawyer to open his mouth again—to let _one_ word, clumsy and vulgar, define what was happening. Silence dragged on, and Arlene just realized that her guests had followed her here. They filled the room with too much people and not enough _Daddy_. It didn't make sense to Arlene, how someone could take in and let out so many breaths, thousands, millions, without ever thinking about it, and yet, here, now, he would _stop_.

"I'm sorry," Caius eventually said, a gruff apology but nonetheless sincere.

"I'm sorry too," Arlene replied just as carefully, "Let's never fight again."

"_Never_," he swore vehemently.

And the same swear had been uttered and broken countless times before. There was a reason why Arlene talked to Caius with the frequently and intimacy of elementary schoolmates. Ever since they _were_ in elementary school, they could not help but snap at each other's throat like born enemies. Although they made up almost immediately and sworn never to raise their voices, inevitably they did, and Daddy had not liked seeing his children fight. So they remedied it in the only way they knew how: to avoid each other.

"I apologize for the sensitive time," the lawyer, seeing the truce struck up, deemed it a good moment to continue, "but there are matters to take care of."

"Right _now_?" Caius growled out.

The lawyer nodded grimly, "It is of importance that you—both of you—understand the situation. As neither of you are of age yet, Mr. Day entrusted me to act out his interests."

"Fine," Arlene nipped out, trying to trap the leaking warmth in Daddy's hand, each callous along his palm speaking to her of a different day that he took her hand. "Just get on with whatever crap you have to say." What did it matter, what this irrelevant person did anyway? Here was her Daddy, his face pale like bleached wood, and she wondered how she could have ever liked pale faces.

The lawyer forgave her rudeness, instead showing her a flicker of sympathy. "Mr. Day left behind his net worth of approximately twenty five million in its entirety to Mr. Caius Day. He set aside a small fund of one hundred twenty thousand— mostly in short-term bonds—for Arlene Diamandis, accessible past the twenty-first birthday."

"Diamandis?" Arlene asked incredulously.

"Your surname as on your birth certificate," the lawyer explained to the princess who never had the need to do anything herself.

"But Daddy…" she didn't even know what she was going to say. She couldn't help but feel a little betrayed, even though she knew that mourning for Daddy was more important than figuring out why he left her so little money—really, what was she going to do with a hundred thousand? She had never once questioned Daddy's love for her, but didn't this seem like some sort of slap in her face, as if to say that she never meant much to him? Still, was not years of indulgence and doting attention more telling than some inheritance? Yet then why would he leave her in such a position, used to the tastes of luxury, yet unable to provide it for herself?

"Loves you indeed," Caius smirked, more cruelly than he meant.

"Fuck you," she answered brusquely, breaking their vow to be diplomatic, and left dramatically.

Her guests flurried after her, all bundles of nervous energy, although none was prepared for tragedy when they packed their bags for winter break. Lily had a hand on her arm, supposedly supportive, and Arlene didn't have the heart to tell the girl that being touched made her nauseated right now. James was ruffling his hair unconsciously, and Sirius was dragging his feet more than usual. Marlene was trying her best to give large, sympathetic eyes, but she was awkward at best when she said, "I wish that I could be as stoic as you when things go badly."

Arlene could only bite the inside of her cheek.

"Are you alright?" Lily asked, trying for a show of empathy instead of an empty question. It ended up being empty anyway.

"I will be in a little bit," Arlene assured, wanting all of them _gone_ so she can puke. Maybe if she puked her intestines out, she could stop feeling so awful.

James's hair was standing up from all the static, before he suddenly thrust his hand into his pocket and took out a flash of gold—the Snitch.

Lily's eyes narrowed and was about to preach him again on nicking school properties, when James shrugged easily and cut her off, "What good is it, locked up, if it can bring a smile elsewhere?" Lily paused, frowned, looked at Arlene's small, absent-minded smile as her eyes tried to follow the ball, and conceded.

The flashing gold reminded Arlene of her last birthday, where Daddy had tried to make her a cake—from cake mix that his PA delivered here, but it was the effort. He had make a gooey heap of yellow muck, and they ended up eating an elaborate three-tiered beast that the PA ordered ahead of time (her lack of confidence in her boss's cooking both discrete and well-reasoned), with a glistening gilt ball that spelled out 'Happy Birthday'.

It felt bizarre to have ever been that happy.

They had retreated to Arlene's room now, and the six of them uneasily spread out in the room, taking space and yet not taking up any at all. There was something uncomfortable about their companionship, something clumsy about the deliberate way they kept just enough distance, and something heavy in the silence.

Marlene was the first to break—she said, in a timid voice, that it was perhaps best for Arlene to get some rest. In order to do that, she excused herself and gave Arlene a quick half-hug. Before anybody could say anything however, there was a slight knock on the door.

"May I come in?" the voice Caius came in through the wood.

Sirius immediately started growling, and shouted back, "No you can't, you arse!" James gave him a nod of encouragement, and the both of them looked at Arlene, as if waiting for permission to beat the guy into a bloody pulp.

Lily sighed and rubbed her temples, and asked Arlene quietly, "Would like me to chase him away?"

Arlene shook her head and instead told Caius, "Come in." She had no idea why these people would think that she wanted to chase away Caius, her only family now, she supposed, but the thought was surreal. There was no love between her and Caius, but… well, family was _family_.

The door opened, and Caius momentarily showed surprise at the group of people congregating inside his sister's bedroom. He quickly gathered himself, however, and demanded, "I want to talk to you," before emphasizing, "privately."

At Arlene's nod, the rest of them shuffled outside, and Remus thoughtfully closed the door softly.

It would have hardly mattered, but Arlene appreciated the gesture; she had, ages ago, charmed the door so that noise flowed inwards without barrier, but no sound would escape it. A one-way silencing charm coupled with a one-way sound enhancement spell, Daddy had been so—

"What is it," she asked Caius with exhaustion, refraining from adding anything abrasive. Not that she could think of anything to say, even if she tried. She could hear James and Sirius murmuring outside, undoubtedly debating listening in to their conversation.

"Oh move _aside_," she could hear Lily huffing, "It's not eavesdropping if she would tell us anyway, and Arlene can't help but talk about everything."

"My Lily-flower," James said, and rushed out before Lily could argue that she was neither _his_ nor a flower, "You are so full of surprises, and this is why my heart will always belong to you."

Although James had said it in his usual dramatic tone, Lily seemed to have forgotten to dispute James's pet name, although whether it was because of Lily's concentration as she cast a spell was uncertain. There was a brief bafflement over the already charmed door, and how Lily's spell bounced backwards, but Lily, the best of their year at charmwork, quickly sorted through the double enchantment and reversed it.

Arlene listened to the bustle feeling cold and detached, and Caius simply frowned until it quieted down again. Being a Squib, Caius did not understand the complexities of sound manipulation, and therefore assumed that their conversation was now indeed private.

Which was why he said, after a meaningful pause, "Marry me."

"…Caius," Arlene said softly after a few seconds, "That's the _stupidest_ thing you've ever said."

He shrugged, for once not taking offense. "C'mon, it'll be grand. We can take on lovers, and I'd have a perfectly good excuse to never settle down."

He was trying hard to trivialize this, and although Arlene disagreed, she appreciated it. "Not the best reason to get married," Arlene objected.

"Good as any."

"I still hope to find the love of my life," she huffed.

"Right," he sneered, "ever the sentimental idiot."

She scoffed, "And ever the cynical bastard."

They fell into a silence; even this banter, edging on a hostile dispute, did not feel like how it was supposed to. It was _contrived_ now, the both of them trying to recreate a dynamic that died along with their father.

"I do… worry about you," Caius admitted eventually.

"You needn't," she waved her hand in a pretense to be flippant. "Daddy is right—I'll be fine."

He quirked his eyebrow, "You _actually_ intend to marry rich? Who then? You've professed disdain for practically every rich boy you've run across."

"Not every," she protested, thinking of Sirius. Sirius didn't seemed to understand the loss of family—family that one _cared_ about instead of wishing death upon—but, well, she had grown out of her disdain for him, she admitted to herself. Daddy would like Sirius, she thought, more than he would like—would have liked—James.

"Think about it at least," Caius probed.

"Of course," she promised him, with a gentle assurance that showed that she was indeed the older of the two.

He nodded, satisfied, and left.

Sirius burst into the room first, offended for her, "What a perverted prat! Who does he think he is?"

"He was trying to be helpful," Arlene defended her brother.

"He's still just snot-nosed, scatter-brained _slug_. Marrying for money, ha!"

Everything was so straightforward to Sirius, she thought, so starkly black and white. She herself was the same but a day ago, but something had changed, died along with her Daddy, her protector, the pillar of her world—no, the creator of her world. Sirius stood before her, beautiful and restless, angry because he did not know how else to behave, and it was so much easier to be angry than to be sad. She wondered if she was a monstrosity just like him.

"I'd like to get some rest," she said to them.

Lily and Marlene nodded, both respectful of her desire for privacy in this moment of personal tragedy. "I'll be here if you want someone to talk to," Lily said before she vanished into the hallway, an earnestness in her voice that made Arlene hate her a little.

James and Sirius looked at each other, some sort of wordless communication taking place, and they too departed. James cast her a last glance, a smile tethering on the edge of nervousness, before running after Lily at full speed. Sirius gave a full bow—the proper sort of etiquette one gave the queen of England, Arlene thought, that looked out of place and frankly offensive in this situation—before jogging off after James, a false bravado masking the same nervousness that James was escaping from.

Remus was the last one remaining. He rubbed the tip of his chin and exited carefully. Before Arlene could gather the energy to rise and close the door however, he returned, with a bottle of reserve tequila in hand.

Arlene didn't know how he found his way around the house, or how he bypassed the heavy cellar lock, and she uncharacteristically didn't care. She simply frowned at him.

He offered her a shy smile. "Normally I disapprove of ignoring one's sorrows in the depth of a bottle, but there are occasions that a little brain damage is justified.

"Go away," she snapped.

"You think you want to be alone, but you don't," he insisted.

No, she didn't _want_ to be alone, but she also didn't want Remus there, with a self-assured smile, confident in his knowledge of exactly what she needed. She also could not stand his peacemaking bottle of liquor—Caius used to do the same thing, whenever their fights got too bad, and both were too fiercely proud to apologize but not wanting to disappoint Daddy. Caius was never so gentle, instead he would throw a bottle her way and make her scamper to catch it—she was _awful_ at catch and he _knew_ it—and they would get so wasted that neither could remember how to fight. She didn't want a reminder of Caius—she didn't even want Caius to begin with, but somehow Remus felt too much like a substitute for her brother.

He was her _brother_, but now he wasn't. Arlene couldn't wrap her mind around that.

Maybe a few shots wasn't such a bad idea, she decided, and yanked the bottle from Remus, throwing her head back and letting the liquid burn her pharynx.

She could feel his eyes on her bared throat. When she lowered her head instinctively, hiding her neck, she met his gaze. His eyes were leaking something bright and eerie, and she felt oddly pierced. All of a sudden he couldn't be further from Caius in any way, and she gestured for them to sit on her bed.

She climbed under her covers, all limbs and lack of grace, and hugged her knees like a little girl, but Remus wasn't looking, instead turning away from her and setting up the gramophone. Arlene couldn't tell if Remus was being considerate, letting her be vulnerable without judgment, or if he really did want to hear the oldie record in the gramophone on her nightstand.

She tightened into a curled ball as the ambiguous echo of the record scratched to a start. The night air was heavy with the sound of old music, the woman's voice a little screechy and melancholy.

_"Let me call you "Sweetheart," I'm in love with you.  
Let me hear you whisper that you love me too.  
Keep the love-light glowing in your eyes so true.  
Let me call you "Sweetheart," I'm in love with you."_

Darkness ruled the house. Day was over, and so was joy. The happy peoples have already sunk into sweet slumber, only to leave the both of them awake, listening to the chorus repeating again and again, the bass voice trembling with thick emotion. The song was sung before either one of them was born—before Daddy was born, even. She thought she was immersing in a well of ancient sadness, sinking with some comfort into the knowledge that there was sadness before her, and also after her.

Or she was just sinking into tequila.

At the same time, she was oddly aware of how no part of Remus's body was touching hers, not even through her duvet—or hers wasn't touching his.

"Did you always know you were _different_?" she asked suddenly.

Remus stiffened beside her and gave no answer, but she wasn't looking for a reply anyway.

"I mean, I always knew that, but not in _this_ way, you know, not the I-shoot-sparks-out-of-wood and the-photos-move kinda way. When did you learn that you had _magic_ in your blood?"

Remus relaxed his shoulders. "Young, very young," to avoid explaining, and maybe because he knew her well, he asked, "When did you learn it?"

That was exactly what Arlene was waiting for. She lost herself in her sprawling memory of childhood, losing also her confusion.

"I first discovered I had magic in my blood when I was ten years old. By then, I had been using magic for ages, but Daddy never knew because, well, frankly, he never looked for it. We had the tallest evergreen oak in our backyard, and I used to sit underneath its boughs in the blurred, West Coast days. I was, of course, the princess of the oak town—I had an easy, baby face, and a natural lilting quality to my voice that all grown-ups adored. Even then, the little boys looked at me differently from the other girls. But I only played with them in the mornings. In the afternoon, I would sleep under my oak tree, and dream of little fairies coming to tell me stories. They would let me breathe golden air and watery light. Together, we played make-believe, and I was the phoenix and the huntress, the flying dandelions and the maiden in the moon. I flew to the second star to the right before I saw Disney make anything out of it. It—_magic_—happened long before Daddy noticed. I was always _making_ things with the spiral oak leaves—little soldiers chasing little foxes, rolling hills of fire and happy stars suspended in air. The blades of grass leaped on top of each other to make a house for my people, and anything I wish—anything—would be born out of leaves and grass and follow my whims with grace. But that summer, that one summer before Fourth Grade, I had found a boy with eyes as green as my grass and hair the russet of my leaves. My stories were no longer of foxes and puppies, but turned into the knight, the prince, the king, and the bard. The sun was long and running, and I let it grow round, because even then, I knew without being able to put it into an idea, I knew that the sun was only young once. Somehow I knew that was my last summer with fairies—maybe I should go into Divination, because that's when Daddy found me, making a leaf-man dance on a stage of silver grass. That was how I discovered that I was _different_, and not just because the boys looked at me in that way. I didn't really understand, and it was less important than my prince-boy kissing _Sophie_ at the start-of-school dance. It did make me feel a lot better though, when Sophie's hair started falling out right then, and she ran out screaming and crying."

She met Remus's gaze straight on when she turned her head. He had a clear gaze, even if he bore, sometimes, the marks of too introverted an attitude. Like the ocean, he accepted all, tolerated all, without so much as a roar.

She felt sheepish for some reason, so she asked, "How did you say you knew again?"

Remus smiled wryly. "Young, very young," he replied vaguely again. He was very good at being vague, she had discovered since September.

"I feel like I stopped being young, just now," Arlene said mournfully.

Remus tilted his head sideways, and did not look judgmental of her self-absorbed angst. Arlene knew that she should be in tears—more orthodox mourning, in any case—but oddly she had no tears in her, and if anything, she wanted to laugh, the laughter trapped painfully somewhere in her chest.

"Maybe it's good to leave it," he said suddenly, "leave this empty house. You won't be able to remember your childhood here if you grow up any more in here."

"You never know what you left in a room and forgot it immediately—it's like a constant treasure hunt," she evaded his point with what she thought was a very witty line.

Remus was not to be deterred however—Arlene remembered how he was the only one who refused to leave her alone. "You're just avoiding it—come tomorrow, you'll have to deal with it."

Arlene fell silent. It took her a moment to admit, "You're right. But I don't know what to do. What should I do, Remus?" she asked him, imploringly.

He just shook his head.

"I don't know—I want love, there is no higher pursuit in life, but I also want money. Is it wrong to want it? Is it wrong to wonder what was Daddy thinking? Is it wrong to be thinking of myself right now?" She bit her lip, and then grew frustrated, "Why should I _not_ think of myself? Who else is left for me? And how can I _not_ want money? I've been raised like a hedge fund baby, and by all means I had expected to grow old like one."

"There's nothing wrong with wanting money," Remus said wisely, as only a poor person could.

Arlene could only grunt in an aggravated manner. "But there's absolutely _nothing_ in the world that I detest more than someone who falls back on love," she cried despairingly. "Why isn't this an easy choice for me? It's obvious—love is—but—I just—I don't even understand myself anymore!"

"It's okay," Remus murmured.

"No it's not," she yelled at him, then pleaded, "I don't understand myself, but _you_ have to understand me! You _have_ to!"

He turned his whole body towards her, and promised in a low whisper, "I do, I understand you."

And he could—at least, he could try, Arlene knew. She abruptly flung herself at him, and hugged him through her duvet, enveloping him in a large cocoon. He wiggled a little, not enough to even move her, but just so he could reach out and take her hand.

When she eventually moved, detaching herself from Remus, the sudden coolness felt like she ripped a piece of her skin off, searing and painful.

_ ._

_And you **believed** him._

* * *

It felt like an Edgar Allan Poe story at first; maybe _The Fall of the House of Usher_, or _The Cask of Amontillado_.

In the surreal quality of the night, Remus kept his head. In fact, he was so levelheaded that, as Augustus lied dying in his bedroom, he could tell you that there was dust dancing on top of his bookshelves. It was proof of a diligent maid rather than an avid reader, though, from the creaseless bindings of the thick volumes. Always a details man, Remus took notice that the books shared no common theme—Hobbes and Varian, Proust and Theognis—beyond being unusually long. A Thomas Cole replica—he hoped it was a replica, at least—of _The Course of Empire_ stared blearily at the man swathed in thick silken duvets.

Arlene was hysterical and weepy, and normally he would have been a little peeved.

Instead, he could only thought of how bravely accepting she had been with her ex-boyfriend earlier in the day, and how tenderly insecure she was about measuring up to Kati earlier that night. These were woes that he might have secretly scoffed at—he _should_ have scoffed at—but he actually felt the sympathy that he displayed. Remus knew that he, despite being sympathetic soul, usually held in disregard the people who blatantly complained of their teenage angst, but there was something … so _earnest_ about Arlene. He couldn't explain it, beyond that perhaps by seeing it, her problems became less impersonal, like how he genuinely felt for Sirius the first time he saw the belt-shaped bruises blossoming on his back.

Besides, with a father concerned with his own life, and a brother who withdrew and was broody most of the time, Arlene had developed in childhood the idea that in order to be heard, one must yell. It was only logical.

He couldn't tell what was worse though—to be faced with the death of a loved one, or to lack all love from one's family to begin with.

Everything up until now just proved that Arlene was born to another world from him. But now that she was plummeted straight into his world, the one not of romance novels but a sprawling ramble with no discernible plot, he wished that she hadn't. He wished that he could somehow push her back into her world of youthful ignorance.

He wished that he could build her a castle and keep her there.

* * *

Note: '_it makes you feel kind of left out to be poor these days_' is from the play by William Inge that tells the segments of one family's (and everybody else's, really) troubles, set in a small town in Oklahoma in the roaring twenties. If anybody read it, they'd know that despite the immense tragedy in the play, it shows that good things can happen. The daughter learns that her shyness is just an excuse to think she's the only feeling person in the world; the son grows defiant and a little caring; the father admits his human weakness and fear of change; and the mother, Cora, the Mrs. Dalloway and Mrs. Ramsey of the household, learns that life cannot ever be just a neat, tidy present.

Author's Note: And if Sirius seems like a worse person in this story than in _However We Know_, remember that we throw a blanket of idealization on whoever we're in love with. Arlene got over her crush, so now she can see the character flaws in him, but Larka was always growing to be more and more in love with the guy. He's not a _bad_ person, just a little careless and a little young.


End file.
